[IDT] Workshop 4: Part 2
Over the past few days I learned various new key commands to run the computer in general, and I also learned how to play a whole new game: Second Life, which taught me many new computer skills. It was very fun, despite what I thought it was going to be in the first few days, and a great learning experience.
I have had several cool experiences with my team, but probably the coolest one was when the fossil we were putting together actually started to look like the skeleton of an animal. Another cool experience would be when we finally got to present our fossil to everyone else; it was definitely a sense of accomplishment.
Three things I learned about Paleontology are
• Synapsids are everything that is not a reptile, have a single hole just behind their eye socket, and lay eggs that do not dry out on land.
• The 3rd mass extinction occurred between the Permian and the Triassic era, 290 million years ago.
• The 3rd mass extinction was the largest as 90% of marine life dies off, as well as 80% of land animals.
Learning in SL has been very different than learning in the classroom because not only do you have to build something when you are told to, but you have to do it using basic shapes, a mouse, and arrow keys, which I think is more difficult. I think the pros are that it’s easy for us (teens) to do something that we could not do otherwise, (i.e. dig up and assemble fossils), which is a great opportunity for us. Some cons I think are that we do not get to do these things in real life, but I think this is a decent substitute.
