Presenters: Anders Arpteg, Ole Victor, Ivar Jung, Alexandra Petrakou, and Päivi Jokela, University of Kalmar, Sweden

Virtual worlds as potential collaborative learning environments (CLEs) is a project initiated by an interdisciplinary group of researches, teachers and PhD students at the University of Kalmar, School of Communication and Design.

The aim of the project is to study virtual worlds as prospective learning environments from several perspectives, with a primary focus on Second Life. The involved project participants represent research areas such as Design, Computer Science, Computer Supported Cooperative Work (CSCW), Media and Journalism, Interaction Design and Music Engineering. Our group works in close collaboration with the international project Kamimo Islands (University of Kalmar, Central Missouri University and University of Molde) and the Swedish project Second Life - Learning environment for the future? (Blekinge Institute of Technology, Umeå University, University of Kalmar and Luleå University of Technology).

The learning process in virtual environment involves the utilisation of interactive course material and various tools embedded in the environment as well as the interaction and collaboration with other actors engaged in the education. The virtual learning processes bring about new exciting possibilities but also new challenges when developing collaborative learning environments. To explore these possibilities and challenges is the joint theme for our group, and in this work we intend to apply various research approaches such as:

1) In which way can virtual worlds enable new 3D-design and architecture in order to facilitate collaborative learning processes?
2) In which way can virtual worlds be integrated with external systems, such as traditional e-learning platforms?
3) In which way can intelligent agents be used to facilitate effective navigation in virtual worlds?
4) In which way can the virtual learning environment be used for synchronous as well as asynchronous communication to support collaboration between the engaged actors?