Global Kids' Digital Media Initiative

Just a reminder that tomorrow, July 1, fifteen New York public high school students will premiere their film Discovered. Discovered is a digital "machinima" film produced in Second Life that explores the powerful issue of child sex trafficking through the fictional story of one Mexican teenager. This is the final product of a year-long, intensive digital filmmaking program called the Virtual Video Project (VVP), an after-school program conducted by Global Kids, Inc in NYC. The students gathered regularly during the past year to learn about film production, human rights, and virtual worlds, culminating in a serious issue machinima film produced entirely by the youth filmmakers.

Come to the premiere of Discovered to meet the youth filmmakers and discover how digital film can be used for global issue awareness and civic engagement.

Event Details:
When: Wednesday, July 1st, 6pm-8pm
Where: Sony Wonder Technology Lab [550 Madison Avenue at 56th St.]
What: Meet & Greet Filmmakers, Premiere of Discovered, and Q & A with students

For more information, see http://www.DiscoveredMovie.com or please contact Shawna at 212-226-0130 x 143 or email: shawna@globalkids.org.

The full text of the News Release follows....

Continue reading "[vvp] Global Kids Youth Leaders Premiere Second Life Machinima "Discovered" Tomorrow in NYC!" »

Posted by Rik at 11:47 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

The (o.o) Festival: First Annual NYC Digital Youth Media & Technology Festival will be this Saturday, June 27, 2009, at The New School, NYC.

We are so thrilled that this event by an incredible coalition has come together to support youth through NYC in our various after school programs. Global Kids has youth showing their VVP year end videos, youth from the Media Masters program showing their digital transcripts, youth from HRAP at South Shore showing their documentary about their school phasing out, and youth from our Expressions program showing the variety of digital media they created about social and global issues.

In addition, youth from the three NY Public Library sites implementing our Playing 4 Keeps game design program will be competing for the best serious game design and we can't wait to see what the youth have created.

The full press release is after the jump.

Continue reading "[media] (o.o) Festival: NYC Digital Youth Media & Technology" »

Posted by joyce at 11:27 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

In a recent article, Gamasutra covers the Games For Change conference cofounded six years ago by Global Kids, as having finally come of age.

"When we started Games For Change, we were coming together based on personal experiences," G4C co-founder and president Suzanne Seggerman tells Gamasutra.

Seggerman and colleagues like GlobalKids' Barry Joseph and current MacArthur Foundation Digital Media and Learning program director Ben Stokes "had all been convinced that games had this powerful potential," she says. "It was basically a huge collective hunch."

Read the full article here.

Posted by joyce at 3:36 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Global Kids projects were the focus of two poster sessions at this weeks GLS, one about the D.I.D.I. initiative and Selen Turkay's awesome study about our Science Through Second Life class at our high school.

We think they were the best posters in the session, but perhaps we're biased. :-)

Images below - enjoy!

Continue reading "[RezEd] Two GK projects highlighted at poster session during GLS" »

Posted by joyce at 5:59 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Below is a brief video from the final Global Kids' final training for the New York Public Library for the Playing For Keeps Capacity Building Program.

More info about this program at http://www.playing4keeps.org.

Posted by joyce at 3:12 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

On March 27, Global Kids held its annual youth-organized conference at Baruch College that brought together 300+ youth and educators from around New York City. The theme of this year's conference was Global Health, with the slogan "Be the Vaccine!"

One of the most remarkable parts of the 2009 GK conference was the live video documentation of the event. Six Global Kids leaders filmed the event "guerilla style," which was then edited on-the-fly by GK staff, resulting in a compilation video about the entire conference that was shown during its closing session. It was a perfect example of the Global Kids's participatory learning approach, having our youth film the conference on their own and for everyone to enjoy the footage that their peers shot. We hope that you enjoy it as well.

Thanks to our guerilla videographers Fio, Jessy Jo, Chanel, Tawana, Amana, and Grace and our MCs Lindsey, Leon and Ashley!

Posted by Rik at 10:24 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

We are happy to report that the public launch of MacArthur Island in Second Life was very successful. The launch featured a live conversation between the avatars of Jonathan Fanton, President of the MacArthur Foundation, and Cory Ondrejka, co-founder of Second Life now at EMI.  Over 150 avatars, plus another 20-some viewers of the live webcast, gathered to participate in this discussion on the future of virtual worlds and philanthropy.

Mr. Ondrejka and Mr. Fanton both spoke very well from their respective and unique positions as a virtual world visionary and a philanthropic pioneer.  They described quite movingly the potential of these technologies to promote the public good, spur new kinds of collaborative action, and capture people’s imaginations towards a better future.  And Connie Yowell of the MacArthur Foundation did a fantastic job moderating the discussion, fielding to Mr. Fanton and Mr. Ondrejka a wide range of questions from the virtual audience.

Click on the image above to see the video archive of the whole event, graciously provided by our friends at Treet.tv. Or visit MacArthur Island yourself at this teleport link.

Continue reading "[conf] MacArthur Island Launch a Success!" »

Posted by Rik at 4:46 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Darren Hayes of the Learning Forward blog posted recently an entry on his thoughts on the Games for Change Toolkit, including thoughts on one of Barry's presentations and his experience playing Ayiti.

You can read his thoughts below or the full entry on his site.

The Toolkit 4 Making Social Issue Games produced by Games for Change is a terrific primer on the state of the industry on serious or social issue games development. This toolkit provides a series of video presentations by leading proponents in the serious games arena and is a great way to start thinking about what’s out there and what’s possible.

In one of the presentations within the toolkit Barry Joseph, Director of the Online Leadership Program for Global Kids, talked about the planning and production of a game called Ayiti, the Cost of Life. “Ayiti” is the Creole word for “Haiti.

In the game itself you have a family in a village in Haiti and you need to guide them through a series of activities over the course of four years where the family members try to earn money on the farm or at various jobs, you try to provide education for the children, stay healthy as long as possible, and generally confront the “cost of life.”

Continue reading "[P4K] When Games Get Serious" »

Posted by joyce at 6:05 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Last month, my colleague Amira and I had the opportunity to speak to several coordinators of Neighborhood Network sites around the country. Neighborhood Networks are onsite, multiservice technology centers aimed at promoting self-sufficiency for residents of assisted housing.

Giving this talk was a good reminder to me of how the older "digital immigrant" population sees Web 2.0 in relation to young people, and how innovative the work we do at Global Kids really is.

Continue reading "[conf] Helping "digital immigrants" see Web 2.0 as an asset for youth" »

Posted by Rik at 6:04 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

We are excited to announce that on Monday May 18, the MacArthur Foundation will be officially launching MacArthur Island in Second Life with a public forum featuring Foundation President Jonathan Fanton and co-creator of Second Life, Cory Ondrejka. Ondrejka and Fanton will be discussing the future of virtual worlds and philanthropy, and then taking questions from the virtual audience. An informal reception will follow.

Virtual world / web simulcast services provided by our friends at Treet.tv.

Head to the Foundations sim (click here to teleport.) on May 18 to participate!

Continue reading "Join Jonathan Fanton and Cory Ondrejka on MacArthur Island on Monday May 18" »

Posted by Rik at 2:19 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

This weekend I went with Shawna and two of the incredible GK Teen Leaders from the Media Masters program to the conference "Learning in a Participatory Culture", put on by our partners up at MIT, Project New Media Literacies.

For me, the event was characterized by a number of things that are marks of a great conference:

The Conference at Massachusetts was amazing! They had people from different places sitting together learning about Global Kids Media Masters and other types of media workshops. The best part of the trip is that we went to a Afghanistan restaurant couple blocks to the hotel, the food was delicious, the hotel was splendid but I was a little unhappy because we could only stay for one night but I totally enjoy that night. My favorite part of the Conference is that I had to tell people about Media Masters, it felt really great and I enjoyed learning about some other part of the workshops like Wikipedia.

The fun part was that I was asking people questions about the conference. One of them was What are you expecting to gain from this conference? It was really fun coming from Brooklyn, New York to Cambridge, Massachusetts. I'm very happy and thankful that Rafi and Shawna and Global Kids make their decision to take me on that trip it was wonderful. Thank You

Posted by Monel - GKm2 at 8:01 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Hello again.

Today my blog will be about the conference at MIT I attended today.

As you may already know, MIT's Project New Media Literacies is actually a partner for the program of Global Kids I attend called Media Masters.

Two of the students who attend that after school activity were chosen to attend it.

We left New York at about four and made it to Boston at around ten that night where, after checking into our hotel were taken out for some Afghani food, which I actually found quite good.

We arrived at the conference at around eight the next morning and were assigned cameras which we used to video the conference and do brief interviews with people attending which we conducted in between workshops.

The conference revolved mostly around a project called New Media Literacy.

Continue reading "[mm/teen/conf] MIT Conference" »

Posted by Shonette - GKm2 at 7:55 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Here's a neat little clip of Connie Yowell of the MacArthur Foundation welcoming the 2008 and 2009 winners of the HASTAC Digital Media and Learning competition, including myself and Amira from Global Kids. Connie always does such a great job synthesizing the broader historic trends, the cumulative impact of the various digital learning projects supported by MacArthur, and where we might be going in the coming years.  This is from the DML Showcase in Chicago on Friday, April 17 that I was honored to be at along with my colleague Amira. 

First off, congrats to all the winners of the 2009 Digital Media and Learning Competition, who are all gearing up to do really innovative and empowering digital learning projects around the world!  I'm blown away by the diversity of work -- from a project to empower civic engagement in Boston's Chinatown to an OLPC laptop-powered education project in rural Chiapas, Mexico, videoblogging in Mumbia, and 14 other amazing digital initiatives.

Continue reading "[staff] HASTAC Digital Media & Learning Showcase: a laptop orchestra, OLPCs in Chiapas, vloggers in Mumbai, and more..." »

Posted by Rik at 4:30 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

On March 18-21, 2009, GK staff member Shawna Rosenzweig and Janet Nabila, a GK youth leader in the Virtual Video Project, attended the National Youth Leadership Council's 20th Annual National Service-Learning Conference at the Nashville Convention Center in Nashville, TN. Above is a youth-produced video from the event, highlighting different workshops, performances and service-learning projects that took place during the action-packed conference. The video was made by the students of New Foundations Charter High School, PA.

To find out more information about the 2009 NSLC, click here.

Posted by Krista at 9:44 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Janet Nabila, a GK leader in the Virtual Video Project, reflects on her experience at NYLC's National Service-Learning Conference in Nashville, TN.

Day One: Arriving in Nashville
Nashville isn’t what I expected it to be. I thought it would look like a farmer’s property or some form of barren wasteland. (Honestly, would you ever go to TENNESSEE for vacation?) I was shocked to see that I was wrong, and that Nashville was totally cool. The city is super ultra clean. Downtown Nashville has everything (significant sites, of course) in walking distance of each other. Although it emphasizes barbecue (yuck!) the cuisine was great. There are sandwiches here that are completely squished together! Anyway, the first day we arrived, Shawna and I did nothing but walk around. Although I was completely taken over by exhaustion by the end of the day, it was worth it. We went to see the Nashville Convention Center, the famous Rymen Auditorium, and the Country Music Hall of Fame.

Continue reading "[conf/teen] GK Leader Reflects On The National Service-Learning Conference" »

Posted by Shawna at 10:36 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Last Friday, Global Kids held its Annual Conference at Baruch College, gathering 600-some students and educators from around New York City to examine critical social issues, meet each other, and get activated.  This year's theme was "Global Health -- Be the Vaccine," featuring speakers and workshops on a wide variety of health-related topics. 

An important aspect of the Global Kids Annual Conference is that the day-long event is entirely youth-led.  Our Global Kids teen leaders are in charge of nearly every aspect of the conference, from the selection of the overarching theme, to the workshop facilitating, MCing, and entertainment.

This year, we tried something new: enabling a team of Global Kids teens to film different parts of the conference using Flip cameras and editing the best clips together into a mini-documentary about the conference that is shown at the closing plenary of the event.

There are a lot of aspects of how this was organized and created that my colleagues Barry and Joyce and I could talk about.  The one lesson that I want to focus on here is how the act of filmmaking got our youth more engaged with the event that they were at.

Continue reading "[staff] Youth-led filmmaking of the Global Kids Conference and virtual simulcasts" »

Posted by Rik at 6:26 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Last Saturday I had the honor of presenting at the Virtual Worlds Best Practices in Education Conference about the work of Global Kids and some of the lessons we have been learning about how to best use virtual worlds for education and learning. The multi-day conference took place in Second Life, appropriately enough given the hundreds of educational projects going on in that platform, but was meant to more broadly cover "educational best practices" from virtual environments writ large.

The title of my presentation was "'Aha!' Moments from Global Kids and RezEd.org." In brief, I talked about how Global Kids and our social network for virtual educators RezEd.org have approached the idea of "best practices" in education and then presented five recent lessons that we've learned about virtual education. You can watch video of my presentation from the new Treet.TV website.

Thanks so much to the VWBPE organizers for inviting me to speak and SLCN.tv for broadcasting my talk to the web. Head to Treet.tv to see more great presentations from VWBPE 2009.

Posted by Rik at 12:23 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Tomorrow, March 20, Global Kids will be streaming from (and participating in) the National Service-Learning Conference in Nashville, TN for the third straight year. The conference is an inspiring gathering of over 2,700 students, teachers, youth-workers and volunteers focused on service learning. For more info on the conference, please see the conference website.

For those who can't make it to Nashville, Global Kids will be streaming several sessions from the NSLC live to the Plush Nonprofit Commons Amphitheater (click here to teleport ).

The complete schedule is as follows:

7 - 8:30am PST: Plenary Session Exciting entertainment and inspiring keynote speeches from Dame Elisabeth Hoodless, the Executive Director of Community Service Volunteers, the UK’s largest volunteering and training charity and Dr. James Hildreth, Director of the Center for AIDS Health Disparities, Meharry Medical College

11:45am - 1:15pm PST: Global Kids Workshop: Virtual Worlds for Real World Service Learning - Intro for Educators
Learn about service-learning projects in virtual worlds such as Second Life and Habbo Hotel. You will gain a deeper understanding how virtual worlds can create more meaningful learning and service in your community.

1:30 - 3pm PST: Global Kids Workshop: Global Kids Workshop: Online Tools for Offline Action - How Generation MySpace Can Change The World
Join Global Kids to check out a variety of cool tools for your service-learning projects both online and offline. Discover how you can use Facebook, MySpace, Youtube, and others to make a positive difference locally and globally.

Posted by Rik at 5:16 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

From February 25-27, I had the opportunity to go to the WebWise conference in Washington DC, an annual gathering of 300-some professionals from libraries and museums to discuss how to keep their cultural institutions relevant in the digital age.  It was great getting to hear from some of the leading museums and libraries in America (The Smithsonian, the Library of Congress, the US Holocaust Museum, the National Endowment for the Arts, etc) about how they are struggling, debating and at times innovating in this space. 

My overall sense was that this is still very much an untested frontier for these often conservative and stodgy institutions.  Most projects I encountered were in the initial planning or pilot phase. But there is also a lot of excitement in the air among these librarians, museum directors, curators, IT experts and web developers about the potential for digital technologies to help reinvent their institutions and reach new audiences with their content and knowledge.

More detailed notes after the jump...

Continue reading "[staff] WebWise 2009: Museums and libraries pursuing the innovative edge in a digital age" »

Posted by Rik at 11:17 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)

If you didn't get a chance to attend last year's Games for Change conference and see Barry's presentation, which was a review of how games used as youth media have evolved over the last six years, it is now up on YouTube.

Posted by joyce at 10:44 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I got an opportunity to speak about Global Kids's approach to youth development and the kinds of services we offer other institutions at "Nonprofit Week" on Orange Island in Second Life today.  It was neat being among the 150 or so avatars who rezzed in for the talks today by my friends Coughran Mayo and In Kenzo, and myself.  Thanks to Jade Lily and Orange Island for the chance to address my colleagues and others interest in the active and growing public good sector in Second Life.

As a recap for those that weren't able to be there, Global Kids has learned a lot in the past three years about how to best leverage virtual worlds for our particular brand of constructivist youth development.  We have found Second Life to be fertile ground for getting young people to engage with each other, create a variety of media, and present that work to a wider audience.  That said, we have some concerns that as Linden Lab considers created a "mixed ages" grid, we worry that some of the unique affordances of Teen Second Life might be lost. 

Beyond our own work, we have a strong interest in facilitating other nonprofits and public institutions to be using virtual worlds to further their own missions.  In particular, we offer a variety of services at various levels, including:

• Event Simulcasting:  We have organized virtual simulcasts of scores of real world events, from conferences to workshops to awards ceremonies.  We can bring a live event to a variety of virtual worlds, such as this speech by Kofi Annan that was simulcast to the web and four virtual worlds.
• Curriculum Development: We have a set of free curricula that can help any institution teach their students how to use Second Life.  Or we can work directly with your institution to develop a curriculum that is unique to your site and population.
• Staff Training: Confused about how to integrate virtual worlds into your strategic plan? We can help you and your staff think strategically and holistically about how these tools can advance your mission.
  
• Summer Camps: We have run summer camps in Teen Second Life for a number of institutions, including UNICEF and the Field Museum of Chicago.  We are able to tailor our programs to fit your schedule and students needs and interests.

If you are interested in talking about any of these services for your own organization, contact me at rik@ globalkids.org.

Posted by Rik at 6:55 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Global Kids is all over the Second Life grid this coming week, with appearances at three high-profile events.  Come by if you want to find out what we've been up to, our views on Teen / Main Grid integration, and how you can support youth development using virtual worlds.  Here's the breakdown:

Metanomics Talk Show
Monday January 26, 12PM PST
Barry Joseph, the director of the Online Leadership Program at Global Kids, will be a featured guest on the Metanomics Talk Show hosted by Beyers Sellers.  See the Metanomics site for more information on how to attend virtually or on the web.

Second Life Education Faire
Monday January 26, 1PM PST
Amira Fouad and Rik Panganiban of Global Kids will be talking about our educational services as part of the first Education Support Faire organized by Linden Lab. We'll give an overview of the various services we provide for other educators including: the RezEd social network, our free curricula, professional development, and event simulcasting.  Catch us at Supporte sim (click here to teleport.)  If you miss us, you can also visit our booth at Olde (teleport link.)

Nonprofit Week at Orange Island
Tuesday January 27, 1pm PST
Rik Panganiban will be speaking about Global Kids as part of a series of great talks by some of the most successful nonprofits working in Second Life.  See the Orange Island website for more info or teleport directly there at this link.

Whew, that's a lot of virtual speaking engagements in two days!

Posted by Rik at 11:11 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

On 09.06.08 I introduced a term I have coined, "the ludic life," and discussed its implications for Second Life and learning. In short, Eric Zimmerman, the game designer, had been making the argument that we have entered "a ludic century." We once moved from an industrial age to an information age. However, we are now interacting with that information in a way Zimmerman finds best described as ludic, which is not to say everything is becoming a game but rather game/play dynamics, aesthetics and sensibilities will increasingly define our social interactions.

While Zimmerman uses Wikipedia as his example, I am looking to articulate that Second Life is a better example and, more importantly, the way in which SL allows users to combine their real life identities and practices within a ludic context not only makes it a powerful space for teaching people how to live a ludic life, but it also becomes the key defining characteristic of the Second Life experience.

Much more at: http://www.rezed.org/group/ludiclife

You can also view the video at: http://blip.tv/file/1642807/

Posted by Barry at 1:01 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Continue reading "OLP's 2008 Year End Review" »

Posted by Rik at 11:57 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)

On Wednesday December 17, Global Kids and Scenarios USA presented the virtual premiere of three youth-written films in Second Life. The screening brought together around 50 teens and adults on both the Teen Grid and Main Grid of Second Life.  The audiences got to watch three short films on the subject of "The Real Deal with Masculinity" written by teens in Texas, Cleveland and New York. 

A report on the event follows after the jump...

Continue reading "[conf] Scenarios USA & Global Kids premiere 3 youth films in Second Life" »

Posted by Rik at 10:50 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Mark your calendars for Global Kids 2009 Winter Benefit to be held in New York City on Wednesday, January 14 from 6-9PM. We will be honoring Vincent Mai, CEO of AEA Investors and Co-Founder of the International Center for Transitional Justice, who has achieved extraordinary success as an international business leader while promoting human rights and social justice issues around the world. The event is being co-chaired by Chris Williams of Williams Capital Group, L.P., and Michael Sonnenfeldt, Chairman of MUUS & Company.

The event promises to be an exciting evening with all proceeds directly supporting Global Kids’ programs. To buy tickets or make a donation, please click here. We are offering for the first time a "young professionals" ticket for only $125 (2 tickets max per reservation.) Your contribution makes it possible to provide our leadership and academic enrichment programs to high school students throughout New York City and around the world.

If you would like to be added to our mailing list or receive further information, please contact Jessica Schulberg at (212) 226-0130, ext 128 or e-mail jschulberg-at-globalkids.org.

Posted by Rik at 12:14 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

On Wednesday December 17, Scenarios USA and Global Kids will be hosting the virtual premiere of the three youth-written short films produced by Scenarios on the subject "What's the Real Deal about Masculinity?". Taking place on both the Teen Grid and Main Grid of Second Life, both youth and adult residents will be able to watch excerpts from the three films, listen to a live interview with two of the youth writers, and ask questions about the films.

DATE: December 17, 2008
TIME: 12:30pm PST / 3:30pm EST
LOCATIONS : Machinima Island , Teen Second Life (teleport link)
International Justice Center, Second Life (teleport link)

This stream will be active during the event only.

Posted by Rik at 4:54 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

We had a very successful Second Life conference on education in virtual worlds yesterday.  This was the first virtual conference sponsored by RezEd.org, the social network for virtual world educators. The RezEd conference featured a panel discussion with educators working in Second Life, Google Lively and Dizzywood; a "birds of a feather" breakout session; and a fun social mixer to close out the evening. With 60+ avatars from a range of institutions and backgrounds, this was a perfect example of how virtual worlds can enable networking, collaboration, and learning in an immersive and ludic environment.

Update November 24: One of our speakers Ryan Clemmens tells us that he was informed 30 minutes prior to speaking at the RezEd conference on November 17 that Google was closing the Lively virtual world at the end of the year. Thus, this was probably the last public address on Google Lively before it was publicly announced on November 19 that it was shutting its virtual doors.

Continue reading "[rezed] RezEd's first virtual world education conference a success!" »

Posted by Rik at 11:41 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Video footage from this year's SandBox Summit now is up on YouTube. You can find the videos here.

Our own Barry Joseph gets to lead the "Show and Tell" portion of the Sandbox Summit!

Posted by joyce at 10:24 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)