PRESENTATION A12

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A SECOND LIFE FOR INFORMATION LITERACY

Beatriz Aroche & Helene Brown
TAFE NSW Libraries, NSW

Aims:

To explore the potential of teaching information literacy to vocational education and training students in Second Life as virtual learning environments are becoming more frequently used in educational practice.

Methods:

Phase 1 - TAFE NSW librarians were involved in a Learnscope project with teachers, educational technology experts and virtual world consultants during 2007. This gave participants the opportunity to explore Second Life and consider the applicability of using virtual worlds in educational delivery and support including professional development, investigation of current educational use of Second Life and applicability of information literacy principles.

Phase 2 - extended the learning and further developed online skills by working in a collaborative way with teachers and students in Second Life.

Results:

The initial phase resulted in:

• one institute hiring a space in Second Life for nominated staff to work with technology experts and consultants to experiment with this technology
• librarians utilising this space to set up an "in world" library presence with a connection to a real world library website

The second phase developed and tested virtual world information literacy training methods by librarians working with teachers using Second Life as part of flexible delivery strategies.

Conclusion:

Virtual environments such as Second Life provide another platform for innovative educational delivery which supports the strategic directions outlined in TAFE NSW Doing Business in the 21st Century. There is great potential for library staff to utilise virtual environments to extend traditional library services to enrich the learning experience of students by providing virtual information literacy and online help.