Global Kids' Digital Media Initiative

Brainstorming about and then deconstructing the ways alcohol and tobacco advertisements work in our society

Last night we had our first Fireside Workshop for May, titled Smoke & Mirrors: A Look at Alcohol and Tobacco Marketing. The workshop was made up of very classic media literacy exercises. We spent time thinking specifically about the reasons that alcohol and tobacco use happen, what the negatives effects of use and abuse are, and the role that marketing plays in shaping a culture where these activities are accepted to large degrees, especially within youth culture. After some discussion about what demographics are and why they're important to advertising, we took a look at a number of tobacco and cigarette ads to do a little deconstruction of the messages being sent, who the ads were targeting and what stories about the products being sold weren't being told.

The workshop went over well, very smoothly. Almost too smoothly actually. The teens there seemed completely comfortable with the activities we did, and pretty much didn't bat an eyelash when they had the opportunity to peel back the veneer of an advertisement's narrative and look at what's under the hood. At the end of the workshop, I thought I'd just ask how many people there had done similar activities to this before. I was amazed! Every single teen there had the done the same thing in the past, in health class! To me, this is revolutionary. When I was in high school (and I'm not that old), we didn't even have health class, let alone one that taught media literacy. Moments like that give me a little hope that our mainstream educational system might actually be improving in certain areas.

On a sidenote, this workshop was the first time I used a published Google Doc to display brainstorms that a group had on a prim, and it worked brilliantly. Doing this is pretty simple, but really powerful. See here for instructions on how to implement it.

Posted by Rafi at 3:42 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

The second Fireside Workshop during the month of April, explored the connection between everyone’s favorite sweet tooth satisfier, chocolate, and human slavery today. Throughout the workshop we learned about how chocolate and slavery are connected in ways many of us were not aware of prior to this workshop. To start off with, we brainstormed about chocolate. Based off of which log around the fire we were sitting on, we were responsible for coming up with chocolate ingredients, chocolate brands, emotions that chocolate can evoke, and occasions where we eat chocolate. One thing was clear, we have a lot of chocolate experts (and oompa loompa fans!) in the TSL community!

As we finished our brainstorming activity, we directed our attention to the lovely GK Fireside poster that became a movie screen. Together we watched a brief video by Cody Maasen presenting some very harsh facts and vivid images of slavery on cocoa plantations on the Ivory Coast (http://www.globalkids.org/olp/sl/chocolate.mov). As the film concluded, the students reassembled in their groups and were asked to create an action plan responding to the film based on their assigned roles (chocolate makers, chocolate-loving consumers, cocoa plantation owners, and human rights activists). Each group then selected one member of their group to present their action plan using voice. To conclude the workshop, we all gathered around the fire one last time to discuss what we learned and how we can help stop human slavery from occurring today, drawing parallels to the past and exploring ways we can make a difference today such as signing an online petition or buying fair trade chocolate.

This workshop was the second time Rafi and I facilitated using voice and it continued to be a great experience. We found the participants stayed involved throughout the entire hour, actively communicating with the group through the type chat. Four teens, representing each of the four groups, presented their action plan over voice as well. This was a first for us and again worked wonderfully. Each group had a team member with access to a mic and all were able to have their mic working without any delay. It was also helpful in saving the time it would have taken to have each group copy and paste their plan into the chat and all groups reading the responses. I am excited to see what other creative ways we can incorporate voice into our facilitation methods in the upcoming Fireside Workshops!

Posted by Shawna at 12:55 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Heritage and culture - they define our identity. No matter where we turn, we are unconsciously exposed to snippets of other cultures, whether it is the taco restaurant around the corner or the fashionable kimonos at the mall. In today's global society, cultures are fusing - we have acquired numerous cultural characteristics that are not native to us. As members of a global MMORPG such as TSL, we need to question ourselves: do we parallel the real world by exhibiting and recognizing other cultures within our grid or do we assimilate?

On March 15, 2008, the Heritage and Culture within TSL intern event was held. The purpose of this event was to discuss if and how does culture play a role in TSL. We started off by defining what one would consider culture and heritage. We came to a consensus that heritage and culture are characteristics that are displayed by one's family origins that are shared by a regional or ethnic group. From there, we routed to the interactive map activity!

Continue reading "[sl/intern/teen]- Heritage and Culture within TSL" »

Posted by Natalia - TSL Intern at 10:27 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Yesterday, for our first Fireside Workshop of April, we focused on the topic of Race in America. Race isn't often a topic that comes up in Teen Second Life, but as became clear in the workshop, is certainly one that affects the real lives of TSL residents. Over the course of the workshop we did some brainstorming on relevant terms, like power, ethnicity, discrimination and education, and over the course of our time were able to establish linkages between many of these terms. We watched a portion of the recent speech by Barack Obama called "A More Perfect Union", in which he speaks directly to how issues of race manifest in this country, and then played a classic activity we do off-line here at Global Kids, called "One Step Forward", where the facilitator says a statement asks participants to take steps forward or back depending on whether it applies to them. (eg - Take one step forward if you were born in the United States, take one step back if you're from a minority group and have sought healthcare). The activity helps to highlight the opportunities that different people have as a result of their race, gender, sexuality, age, income and other factors.

Continue reading "[tsl/leadership] Fireside Workshop: Race in America" »

Posted by Rafi at 2:31 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

After taking a bit of a break from my event I hosted as a Global kids intern, I was asked to help out with a new project for GK. After being given a bit information on the Visions of Global Art Contest, it seemed interesting, and something I could participate in helping with . Right from the start, I began to compile a list of things essential to promoting and getting the contest started. Of the first tasks were posting in the forms/event list, and creating a poster that would reach out to teen residents to participate. After doing a little bit of thinking for the idea of the poster, I was soon finished it, and it was ready to be put up and displayed around Global Kids Island. Once the posters were placed, events listing of the Global justice workshops and the announcing of the winners went up.

Continue reading "[tsl/intern] Giving a helping hand.... for justice!" »

Posted by Mat Brocco - TSL Intern at 5:28 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Why!? Why did nobody come to my interns event? Not enough advertising? No. I advertised everywhere that you possibly can in Teen Second Life. Not an interesting enough topic? No. The topic that this event was based off of came from the most popular topic ever on the Teen Second Life Journal (http://tsljournal.com). What could it have possibly been? I do not know.

On Sunday, March 16, 2008, I attempted to host an event entitled "No Justice in Second Life? - The Discussion." It was supposed to be based off of the article on the TSL Journal "No Justice in Second Life?", which was the most popular article we have ever had on there. I am unsure of what it was that drove people away, but I do have one theory.

People just weren't interested in it. My previous event, violence in video games was a huge hit because it appealed to everyone who plays Second Life. Maybe the people who were on at the time of the event had more interesting things to do.

I don't know.

Hopefully I will choose a better topic next time.

-Nick (Nicholas (Wealthy Bourgeois)) Kit

Posted by Nick - TSL Intern at 2:19 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Rafi shows off his ICED! shwag before the game release.

For our first February Fireside Workshop, we held game launch party for ICED!, an RPG which focuses on issues related to immigration and deportation. It was particularly nice to hold this kind of workshop in Teen Second Life, where we're already starting off in a 3D graphic engine, and moved to another 3D graphic engine to play the game!

25 teens from around the grid dropped in, and we had some incredible discussion come up in regards to deportation. From the start, many of the teens asked the hard questions. Are things actually wrong with the current immigration system? Isn't it a good thing to deport citizens if they commit crimes, even minor ones? Part of what became evident, both through the discussion but especially the game play, is the lack of justice that currently exists in a system that lacks due process, where people that break the law don't have a chance to get a hearing, and where immigrants are often held for indefinite periods of time.

Workshop participants congregate by the GK bonfire and discuss ICED.

These discussions lead to broader, systemic questions, such as what universal human rights are and why there aren't currently effective systems in place to enforce that these rights are respected. At the end, it really felt like the teens in attendance got to experience the issue in a new way, and through the game were able to get an experiential sense of the unfairness of many aspects of the current US immigration system.

Posted by Rafi at 10:22 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)

What's that? Is it a bird? Is it a plane? No! It's something even more awesome! It's Nicholas Kit flying past on his SegTech™ segway by Brooke Barmy that he purchased at this weekend's Media Group Tech Expo sponsored by The Media Group and Global Kids!

Nick flying by on his awesome new SegTech™

This Sunday, I hosted the Media Group Tech Expo hosted by the Media Group and Global Kids. The goal of the show was to show everyone the greatest and latest technology in Teen Second Life. Over all, I would say it was rather successful, because many people came and we had many vendors.

At first, I made a mistake. I forgot to unlock the land on which the event was located so people could come in! When I unlocked it, we teleported many people to the location and the event kicked off with a bang! I watched how the how thing was going on my new SegTech™.

A snap of the event!

After a few minutes of people browsing, I started advertising out best offers, and all of a sudden, people went to the offers like clockwork! The whole goal of this event was to raise some money for charity while at the same time having fun, and I would say it was a success. The event ended after one and a half hours and 20% of all profits were collected for charity. This event was great!

-Nick

-Nicholas Kit

Posted by Nick - TSL Intern at 10:10 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Continue reading "[sl/intern/teen] Beauty, Real vs. Perceived?" »

Posted by Nafiza - TSL Intern/VVP at 3:21 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

The January issue of the New Jersey magazine The Parent Paper, has an article entitled "Student's Try a Virtual World", which spotlight's both the programs Global Kids and Ramapo are running within Second Life.

They quoted Barry several times regarding TSL.

“Once we went into Teen Second Life, we found things we didn’t find anywhere else. In Teen Second Life you have a spatial relationship with others around you and it feels like you are with people. We could do the same workshops for kids virtually that we were doing in reality.

We could do these workshops in ways that we never thought were possible. In Teen Second Life you don’t have to just imagine you are in a factory – you are in a factory. And teens are building the factory. A lot of our top down approach for spreading information was met equally with ideas from the bottom up. The space is about putting young people in charge and giving them tools. What we are able to do as educators in that space is tap into nascent leadership skills.”

The article goes on to mention CONSENT! And our Playing 4 Keeps program, our TSL interns, along with our upcoming science curriculum and the DIDI Youth Venture program. The only thing the article got weird, is a misquote on the number of sims owned by educators…he would have never said 3,000. ;)

“When you are using Second Life you are going into the youth media space. It’s our youth’s playspace and is our workspace. We can’t force ourselves into their world, or them into ours, we have to work together.”

Download the full article here.

Posted by joyce at 1:26 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Hey everyone, it's me again, Nicholas Kit in-world.

Just last week I ran my Second Global Kids Interns event, entitled, Violence in Video Games, and I am glad to say, it went off without a hitch! This event was intended to teach residents of Teen Second Life about how violence in video games really affects you, but it ended up being much more than that, and it was a learning experience to everyone.

The main goal of this event was to teach people about the true affects of violence in video games. With today's media's video game pounding attitude, some people think that if you play a violent video game, you, yourself will be very aggressive, which is not true, and this event taught the true effects of it.

When the event started, many people showed up, which is always a good thing! An overview of the event was given, and then we moved on to human barometer. I tried something new with it, because frankly, I never played Human Barometer before and wasn't too sure how to do it! I asked factual questions (not opinion questions, which is the norm) and we discussed why people chose the answer that they did, to try to sway the people who were not sure. The statements included were things like "Violent video games make everyone aggressive", and "Violent video games are the root of teen violence". (Both having the answer of false).

Then, we moved on to discussion and discussed people's different views of violence in video games and I passed out a fact sheet. The fact sheet included things like "For video games to create a killer, you need a bad home environment, a mental problem, and stimulation like video games or music." We discussed all the new information that I passed out, and then the event was wrapped up.

This was a good learning experience for everyone, including me. We all got to see everybody else's views, and learned about different way video games affect people. Overall, I think this was another success. I can not wait until my next event!

-Nick

-Nicholas Kit :) :) :)

Posted by Nick - TSL Intern at 3:08 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

For our first Fireside Workshop of December, we focused in on the issue of nuclear proliferation and what it means vis-a-vis international politics and multilateral treaties like the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT).

We started off first by playing a game that illustrated the flaws in an international system that is not transparent in regards to nuclear weapons, and then went on to break into teams, each of which received a different real life nuclear scenario which laid out the time lines and issues related to situations actually occurring right now in the world. Each team was then given time to come up with policy recommendations about how they believed their nuclear scenario should be dealt with.

I have to say, I'm regularly impressed by TSL residents, and this particular case was no exception. The teams came up with some really impressive proposals for approaches to challenging situations involving nuclear weapons programs in Iran, India and Israel. Check them out below. While obviously these situations are all enormously complex, I felt that the overall thread of transparency and compromise that went through a number of the recommendations are solid values to have underpinning ones outlook on international affairs. Awesome work!

Israel:
As representatives for the panel of presidential policy advisers, we believe it is ethically important to continue to support Israel and keep them as an ally to our government. While continuing to support Israel, we also recognize the importance of having Israel sign the NPT agreement so other governments will have a better understanding of Israel's nuclear program rather than being in the dark about their plans. It is important to support Israel in a comprehensive peace plan to attempt to create peace between Israel and some of this neighbors, including: Egypt, Syria and Saudi Arabia.

Iran:
Push For economical sanctions against Iran.

We chose this because an attack could have dire consequences, and diplomatic negotiation could scare Iran. If we chose to attack, and they had a secret nuke facility somewhere, they could choose to attack us back, and we do not want to start a nuclear war because.... uh... that would be bad....... If we chose the diplomatic route, Iran could get scared thinking that it could possible be a diversion, or that we had a back-up attack plan, so they attack us.

India:
We need to push the country of India to sign the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty (NPT) because they need to be held to the rule set by the United Nations’ International Atomic Energy Agency. They will have to submit to inspections by the United Nations’ International Atomic Energy Agency so that their weapons status will be available to the world and stop Pakistan from thinking that they have to develop more nuclear weapons and finally firing them at India. Having India sign the NPT will also keep them from helping non-nuclear states attain nuclear status. The only con that I can think of would be that the Indian people may resent having to submit to the inspections and having their weapons status open to the world.

Posted by Rafi at 11:00 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

It was great to see you all Nov. 14 to watch the MacArthur conference streaming event. I hope you all enjoyed grabbing a seat in the marshmallow chairs and hunkering down to watch the conference unfold in LA, and all you guys camping out even as the event rolled over the allotted time. Due to a few technical difficulties the sim went down for a few moments, but the crash was quickly recovered from and the stream continued with little trouble.

I was glad I could catch all your reactions to the Witnessing History exhibit, and even better we were able to hold a mini-panel as to the process in creating the exhibit with Coheed Babenco, an original United States Holocaust Museum ambassador who worked with Global Kids and the Digital Refinery team from the start to shape the look and feel of the Witnessing History event.

It was a small but great turnout, allowing everyone to step into to the role of a reporter investigating the Night of Broken Glass. I was glad to capture all your reactions to the new exhibit! It was a wonderful experience, and I can only hope I can work on such an event again. Thanks to all who came, I certainly hope you all enjoyed it.

Posted by Dion - TSL Intern at 2:44 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Participants deliberate over the issues, and one shows his support for Ron Paul

This past week we held the first in a series of Fireside workshops titled What's Your Stance?, which focuses in on a selection of presidential candidates to figure out their stances on the issues that teens that participate feel are the most important. We focused on Rudy Giuliani for the first in this series of workshops, and plan to alternate between Democratic and Republican candidates, exploring each.

The approach of the workshop was a unique one, one where I hoped to not only have participants become informed about where a participant stood, but also learn skills relating to finding credible sources online. They were tasked with first voting on what they felt were the most important issues (the options included topics like Campaign Finance Reform, Immigration, Social Issues like abortion, Global Security and others), and then broke into teams go scour the web to find out Rudy's stances on the issues, and include where they got their information from and why they believed it to be credible.

The participants did a great job of finding information on a host of issues, stating Rudy's stances on a number of them (no timetable for Iraq, claims to keep taxes low, little to no sound policy on the environment), but I think that the lesson learned is that it takes a bit more time than we expected to find and source all that info within one workshop (we'd planned for 25 minutes of research and it took more like 50 minutes), so we may need to tweak the structure to cut some of the time involved. We'll be sure to update on what works for future workshops like this one.

At the end of the workshop, we all (well, almost all, there were some protests...) put on Giuliani heads and took a pic together. What a hoot!

Posted by Rafi at 2:14 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

The warriors prepare for the upcoming battle of wits

The event started like any other, “Welcome everybody, and thank you for joining us for this event: ‘The Teen Grid – Evolving, or Devolving? What we can do to help’.” Alex Harbinger began, “The event will now officially begin, starting with a human barometer moderated by myself. If you have never participated in a human barometer before, this is a quick rundown of how it works: There are three options you may pick: Agree, Not Sure, or Disagree. Upon choosing an opinion on a statement I will say, you move to any of the three areas, and may share your opinions.”

The Event, ‘The Teen Grid – Evolving, or Devolving? What we can do to help’, which took place last Saturday (November 10th, 2007) was filled with heavy opinions. Kicking off the event was a Human Barometer (see above) where some basic statements were made, and the participants would state their opinions:

Continue reading "[sl/intern/teen] Intern Event: The Teen Grid – Evolving, or Devolving? What we can do to help" »

Posted by Alex - SL Intern at 10:47 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Moo Money posted an excellent overview of the event held on Global Kids Island by one of our interns Alex Harbinger and the issues that were raised by the teens. You can view the full post below or here, where you can also read the great comments left by others.

Teen Grid: A sad state of affairs
by Moo Money Nov 13th 2007 @ 5:33PM

I logged into the Teen Grid this Saturday to attend a Machinima tools presentation by HVX Silverstar. Before I could teleport to Eye4You, I ran into a group of teens gathered on Global Kids island. Alex Harbinger was holding his monthly intern meeting, with this one being about the state of the Teen Grid.

Since this topic concerned me, I decided to stick around and weigh in. What I learned was downright depressing. Most of the teens were very unhappy with their current experience on TG. I gathered some of their experiences, including pictures, to share with the Massively readers. I hope this helps you get an accurate description of what they're facing over there.

The first part of the event involved a human barometer, with three choices. For each statement, you would choose from Agree, Not Sure, or Disagree. Some of the results were surprising. The second part involved an informal discussion where they could sound off about anything.

Continue after the jump to see the questions and highlights from the event ...

Continue reading "[sl] Moo Money's coverage of Alex's State of the Teen Grid event" »

Posted by joyce at 3:48 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Hello everybody! I am Nicholas Kit ingame! This is my first year as an intern and I was really excited to know that I got accepted. This wednesday, I held my first intern event, called CRC@18. What it basically was, was the celebration of the CRC's 18th birthday. The CRC is the Convention on the Rights of the Child. What it basically does is gives all minors a stress-free and healthy life to grow up with. It was written by the United Nations and has been accepted by every country except Somolia and the United States. Even though every country has it, it doesn't mean that it is enforced. That is what the goal of this event was.

The main goal of this event was to teach teens about there rights, as given to them by the CRC. Most teens do not know what all their rights are, so this event was really helpful. We started the event off by showing 10 one-minute machinimas which were created by the CRC Machinima Camp this summer.

It seemed like everyone really enjoyed these films. After the showing, I had some of the people who made the films speak for our audience. They told what the best part about the camp was and how they felt after learning about the CRC. They also talked about how important the CRC really is. They told how that without it, many rights would be ignored.

Lucky Figtree Speaking

And then, for our final act, we went outside and took some pictures with our "Children's Rights Rocks" and had a party. That party lasted forever.

This event was very fun and interesting. I cannot wait to do another one in the coming months. Well, I see everyone then!

-Nick
-Nicholas Kit

Posted by Nick - TSL Intern at 5:14 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

On Monday of this week, I hosted the second monthly Fireside Workshop of the month surrounding the topic of Media Piracy. Many of our interns showed up to participate, as did a few other residents. After introducing myself and the workshop topic, I asked the participants to head over to our very popular "Human Barometer" platforms to begin the first activity. During this activity, I presented the group with a series of 3 statements and then asked that they move to the platform which best showed their personal opinion on the topic. The options, if you aren't familiar with the barometer activity are: agree, disagree and not sure. The statements I presented were: Downloading licensed & copyrighted music without purchasing it is ethical, It’s ok to share files of TV shows with others, given that networks air them publicly anyway, and Downloading licensed & copyrighted movies without purchasing them should be legal.

We received some really interesting responses to these different statements, most of which were leaning toward the view that media piracy is not something that is ethical and should remain illegal. It would be interesting to know how many of these teens actually *do* download music illegally, however. That question still remains!

Continue reading "[intern/teen/tsl] Media Piracy Fireside Workshop!" »

Posted by Mercury at 3:56 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

October 24th was an interesting day on Global Kids island, which is where I hosted my first event for Global Kids. For my event I decided to bring an issue that effects the U.S every day, which is immigration. After planing and working on how my event would run, it was interesting and also relieving to see that a good handful of people made it to participate in the event. Among those people were some of the other Global Kids interns which was also great to see support from them. After everyone settled in, I than gave a brief Introduction to what this event was about and what was going to take place. After that, it was finally time to get started, and get those opinions flowing!

Continue reading "[sl/intern/teen] Immigration Event on GK island" »

Posted by Mat Brocco - TSL Intern at 8:30 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

“You have to find hope in hopelessness itself…the human spirit is enormously strong,” were the final words I heard from Ishmael Beah as I exited Second Life. Although he related it to the war in Sierra Leone and his missing family, it is a powerful statement that we can all relate to and incorporate into our own lives. Unfortunately, I could not stay to hear the various questions people had for Ishmael, but I did have wonderful help from fellow TSL residents who filled me in on the questions presented to him and his elegant responses. I am getting a little ahead of myself though, but I just wanted to begin with that quote because it really left a wonderful and lasting memory.

Let me start at the beginning, since it is after all the most convenient place to begin. Hello! I am Nafiza, or Nafiza GKid. First thing I should clarify is that I am NOT an adult; I have the last name GKid because I was brought into Teen Second Life by Global Kids when I first joined their Virtual Video Project program. Currently, I am a Global Kids Intern on TSL and my very first ever online-facilitated event was this one, in which Ishmael Beah was streamed into TSL on the Eye4You Alliance island (10/18/07). I joined this program because…well there are several reasons. The most obvious is because I feel strongly about global issues and love seeing other people’s perspectives on these issues. The other reason is that…I wanted to have this experience—not for a resume or a college application—but for myself. I think that if I can prove to myself that I am capable of doing something, then I can prove it to any other person in the world.

Another part of it is that I have facilitated a workshop in the GK Annual Conference, so I did want to see what it would be like to do something like that in Second Life. Trust me when I say, that although you have to concern yourself with public speaking and expression in real life, dealing with some of the messes that can occur in Second Life can be somewhat more frustrating. At the same time, it is much easier to “brush-off” misbehavior on SL than it is to do in real life. The one thing that makes doing this in SL so hard is getting people to stay active, interested, involved, and to keep their attention. Also, I think they were very anxious to hear from Ishmael that they became impatient and also frustrated/bored when I was doing the screening. I can’t say that I blame them because it can be pretty boring to just sit there and watch someone typing. I tried to ask them questions to keep them engaged though, I don’t know how much it helped, but they seemed to respond very quickly and well to the questions so that was a good sign. One thing I can say for sure is that they did enjoy and they were somewhat mesmerized by Ishmael while he was speaking because they responded to all the things he said. Some times in awe, after hearing the reality of war, and sometimes with applause for his elegant words. Although they did not have the same privilege as I did to meet him in person, I think they still understood him to be the warm but strong individual he is just by hearing his voice and words. Lee Soothsayer commented that the event was “deep and very informative”.

Continue reading "[sl/intern/teen] Ishmael Beah & My 1st Event!" »

Posted by Nafiza - TSL Intern/VVP at 3:56 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Hey everyone, it's Lucky again :)
I'm very happy to say that I'm in the intern program once again; and on Saturday, I held my first event. It was a Human Barometer game, focusing on new ideas and suggestions for my group, Disability in Teen Second Life. In case you don't know, Human Barometer is a debate type game, where the host gives all the participants a statement; and asks them to think about it. Once they have an opinion on the said statement; each individual moves their avatar to one of three platforms labeled, 'Agree, Disagree or Unsure' based on what they're thinking. Once everyone is positioned on a platform, the host then asks them for opinions on what they think and believe in. See below:

Continue reading "[sl/intern/teen] DSTL Event!" »

Posted by Lucky - SL Intern at 3:44 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Thanks to Dion Zabelin for creating this great poster!

As part of GK's TSL Internship Program, we'll be running the affectionately titled "Fireside Workshops" twice a month by the camp fire on GK Island. These global issues oriented workshops are modeled off of our face-to-face afterschool workshops that we've been conducting for 17 years in New York City public schools, but we get to add fun Second Life twists to these activities that are already interactive.

For our first workshop, we created a take on the classic workshop originally developed by Bill Bigelow in his book Rethinking Schools. It's called The Race to the Bottom, also known as The Transnational Capitol Auction (but try getting TSL residents to something with that name...)

More details and photos after the jump.

Continue reading "[sl/leadership] GK Kicks off "Fireside Workshops" with interactive game on Globalization" »

Posted by Rafi at 12:19 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Global Kids’ island, GK Serious Gaming

“Video games may be good for your brain” is the catch phrase on an article posted on DailyTech. A recent study published in the Canadian Journal of Experimental Psychology claims that video games can actually protect people’s brains from aging, and make them better at multi-tasking, along with providing them with an edge over non-gaming people.

Global Kids’ island, GK Serious Gaming, now features a fully operational and exquisite array of multi-player and single-player games within Teen Second Life. The island includes popular games like Tringo, Teengo, Word Hex, Harbinger Says, Word Spill, Busted, Harbinger War, and more!

Continue reading "[sl/teen] “Video games may be good for your brain”" »

Posted by Alex - SL Intern at 11:29 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

We have finally begun Round 2 of the GK Internship Program! After receiving applications and reviewing them, Rafi and I decided that all made wonderful candidates. So, we invited all 5 applicants to become GK Interns, and are pleased to announce that all accepted! Without further ado, the new interns are: Dion Zabelin, Mat Brocco, Nicholas Kit, Nafiza GKid, and Pdiddy Docherty.

Yesterday, we held our very first orientation meeting for the program, which went well over all. First, we began with a fun team building exercise called "Bomb & Shield." In this activity, everyone had to choose one person in the group to be their "bomb" and another to be their "shield." They were then asked to send Rafi an IM with their choices. Once everyone submitted the names of their bomb & shield to Rafi, participants were instructed to hide behind their shield so that they would not be exposed to their bomb. This required constant repositioning to keep themselves protected by the shield. After a few minutes, Rafi said FREEZE! Those who were not protected by their shield were out.

During the next portion of this activity, we repeated the activity, but subtracted the step of IMing Rafi with the choices of bomb & shield. After playing for a second time, the interns were asked what the difference was between the first and second rounds. Nafiza GKid's response was "we tell you versus we dont tell you", which lead to the discussion of trust and how Rafi & I will be trusting the interns as representatives of GK.

Next, we all gathered to sit in a circle of chairs and Rafi asked the group "What are ways that you think all GK interns should act?" We received some great responses from the interns - respectful, willing to learn, open-minded, etc. Rafi then went over the basic GK intern Guidelines, which are:

- Always act respectfully
- Be a model TSL resident
- Be humble!
- Be patient
- Act responsibly (eg - respond to email in a timely manner, keep to deadlines, etc.)
- Help other GK interns when they need help.
- Be sure to come to the monthly meeting and one of the GK Fireside workshops each month, and keep to your commitment of at least one project or event every other month.

After mentioning the last guideline about GK FireSide workshops, which Rafi and I will be holding each month, he went into further detail. Interns will be required to attend at least one of these workshops each month. Interns were also encouraged to help Rafi and I with our events in order to improve their event management skills.

The talk about the monthly Fireside events transitioned to the next portion of the meeting, in which I displayed 3 different slides from past intern events. The slides were little snippets of blog entries that interns from round 1 had posted. After going through them all, a couple interns who participated in Round 1 described their events to the group. If the interns have any ideas they want to discuss with us in terms of events, we let them know that we are available as a resource to them.

Following the slides from previous events, I went on to ask the group what the phrase "Global Issue" meant to them. We received some wonderful responses. Pdiddy Docherty responded "something that alot of people care about and want to discuss and debate about" and Lucky Figtree stated " An issue that effects the global population". I then went on to show a few examples of Global Issues in the category of Trade, Economy, and Related Issues. After they understood the basic concept of what a Global Issues is, I asked them to brainstorm Global Issues that fell into these different categories:

• Health Issues
• Human Rights Relates Issues
• Geopolitical Issues
• Environmental Issues

All of their responses to the brainstorming event were relevant and did fit into one of these categories. After they had shared a few, I put up slides for each of those categories with examples of specific issues - a lot of which they already shared during the brainstorm. So, they really hit the nail on the head and understood the concept of Global Issues. The purpose of this activity was to give them a better understanding on what a Global Issue is. It also proved to help spark ideas for event topics that they could hold in the future. I'm really glad everyone understood.

After my activity, Rafi described how events are handled. He mentioned that all event proposals by interns needed to be sent to him at least 2 weeks in advance for approval. The blogging process was also covered in great detail. Interns will have to blog about their event after hosting it - making sure to include details about the planning process, setup, coordination, turnout, and reflections. We also covered the topic of event promotion, which includes posting in the TSL forums, events page, and of course word of mouth. I also offered myself up as a resource for interns if they need any help with event promotion.

Finally, it was time for the interns to choose a date to hold their first event! We have set up a Google Calendar for the Interns, and each week was labeled Slot 1 through 8. Each intern was asked to choose one day within a slot to host their event. No more than 1 intern could choose a day in any given slot, so it was first come first serve. Worked really well actually. Everyone chose the slot they wanted and are committed to hosting their events. We are looking forward to seeing what they come up with!

Posted by Mercury at 3:44 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

... applications are open for second round!

For the past 5 months, we've been experimenting with a new internship program in Teen Second Life. In the program, teens were given the opportunity to create their own projects and events on GK island, and at the same time come together once a month as a group to reflect on their work and give feedback about what went well and what could be changed in the future.

We had some great events that came out of the program which displayed the incredible talent and leadership among the teens of TSL. Click the links below to check out posts from the interns themselves about various events they coordinated.

Yesterday, I was given the opportunity to attend the first day of Interdependence Day V, a conference that’s taken place every year alter Sept. 11, 2001. This year, it’s taking place in Mexico City, which is where I live. =D

Why Interdependence Day? After the Sept. 11 happenings (in the US), a lot of people have focused on discussing terrorism, war and loss. This conference proposes to think about the consequences of it all on interdependence: the dependence of individuals, groups and countries of each other.

The reason why I was there yesterday is Second Life. There was a panel on the role of virtual worlds in this interdependence being streamed into the MG, and with participants both in-world and offline. It was very nice to see people that I’ve never spoken to but had actually heard of, like Mark Wallace (even if I didn’t recognize him right away). The presentations were brilliant. Sadly, a lot of the people in the audience, not getting to know the principles and practices in SL, were quick to openly classify virtual media as a set of banalities where all that 100% of the people care about is fashion and pornography.

The disagreement sparked a brief discussion (as there were severe time limitations); the bad thing is it prevented two of the virtual panelists from making their presentations, as the request for a time extension was denied.

I think that anyone who attended this panel has comments about it, including me, because it is an endless discussion; however, I have to admit I’m disappointed to see the refusal of major decision-makers and, above all things, people working in the academia of social science themselves refusing to listen to what people have to say just because it is based on a reality that they can not physically experience fully.

In my opinion, the problem is that virtual media are often seen by people who are unfamiliar with them not as media to get messages across, but as the proposal itself for as a solution to problems. I’d say that equals to saying, for example, that education is pointless because not 100% of the people who have formal education at some point in their lives take advantage of it or use it for the improvement of society. Still, that’s just my opinion, and this subject should be discussed and analyzed to death before drawing any strong personal conclusions. =P

To end, I just want to thank Global Kids and the USC, especially Rafi Santo and Tori Horton, for this wonderful opportunity. Now I hope I’ll be able to attend more SL and digital media-related conferences in the future. =D

Good luck to all the participants of the conference in the remaining days!

Posted by Mariel - SL Intern at 11:09 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Hello everyone! As some of you may know, I was lucky enough to attend the Second Life Community Convention in Chicago this year with Global Kids. During my 3 day stay, I attended various panel discussions and even moderated a teen panel on Saturday about the CRC Machinima Camp that was held in Second Life. It was an absolute blast!

Continue reading "[slcc] My SLCC Experience!" »

Posted by Mercury at 9:27 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Today was the launch of the teen grid's own version of the popular main grid fundraiser, the Second Life Relay For Life. The Relay raises money for cancer research and patient services, and we're really excited to have it here on the teen grid.

The kick-off event turned out amazing! We had a whole bunch of people come and dance with us, including Uggh Oh (aka Randy Moss of the American Cancer Society) and we raised quite a bit of linden! Check it out!

Over L$30,000 in an hour, and we're at L$32,782. It's an outstanding amount of linden, for the first day; and I'm very very proud and thankful to everyone that has helped. I'll keep you all posted on upcoming Relay fundraisers here on the teen grid! :)

Posted by Lucky - SL Intern at 9:38 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

This year's CRC Machinima Camp has been a blast so far! I can't believe we're nearing the end of week 2. It seems to be flying by so quickly, with both ease and fluidity.

Our campers are super stars, and have all demonstrated their adeptness to listen and concentrate on what is being taught during the workshops. They even given each other and the facilitators excellent feedback when discussing storyboards. I'm really looking forward to seeing what they come up with in terms of their storyboards, and their set/prop design, which has already begun on all parts of the island. It will be fun to see the evolution of sets being created, and the kind of creative details that will be added along the way! Oh, and props to Moo Money for taking the time to facilitate educational workshops during camp this week. Moo has done a fantastic job teaching the campers how to create their storyboards, and showing them examples of machinima she has created in the past.

Posted by Mercury at 8:12 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

This morning, I had the opportunity to give students in Washington, DC, a tour of Teen Second Life. The purpose of the tour was to inspire them for their upcoming project with the Holocaust Museum and to spark thoughts and ideas that they themselves could take advantage of when creating their project. I wanted to show the students the best of the best, so I took them to the following locations:

Continue reading "[sl] Teen Second Life Tour!" »

Posted by Mercury at 10:49 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)