OpenSimulator Community Conference 2018

This presentation gives an overview of how project-based learning principles can guide the design and development of games and activities to supplement language learning in OpenSIM. The presentation arises from the EU funded GUINEVERE project on games in immersived environments.

Starting from a focus on project-based language teaching (PBLT) this presentation investigates a vision of language education for the digital age in which learners and instructors have the opportunity to integrate a range of skills in addition to those associated with traditional forms of language instruction such as learning vocabulary and grammar or working on fluency, accuracy and complexity. This vision is outlined in relation to a two-year EU project called GUINEVERE (Games Used IN Engaging Virtual Environments for Real-time language Education) that investigates the potential of digital game-based learning in 3D immersive environments focusing on foreign language learning (2017-2019). OpenSim is one of three platforms used in the project, alongside Minecraft and Second Life to provide a variety of games for students in the different languages of the project partners (English, German, Italian, Turkish). The project explores how game-based learning and virtual learning environments may be used as digital tools to develop collaborative and creative learning environments. As the project approaches the interim period, this paper provides an overview of its activities and planned Intellectual Outputs (IOs). This approach has been defined more broadly as project-based learning in the general sense, as it incorporates multiple rather than single unconnected tasks, or technology-mediated project-based language teaching (TMPBLT), as it identifies a key role for collaborative digital technologies in the process. In this presentation we are also positioning this idea in relation to what we are calling ‘post-language studies’, as the approach enables teachers and learners to integrate a range of lifelong learning skills such as technical skills, digital literacy skills, intercultural communication and project management, alongside a traditional focus on linguistic competencies normally identified with language learning. Thus, the paper aims to articulate a vision of language learning that moves the discipline from the margins of the school or university curriculum to one that is at the centre of an interdisciplinary or theme-based approach to learning. All of the virtual world islands provide playgrounds for young learners where they can explore a variety of collaborative and individual games. The project provides a critical overview of the key research literature in the field and explores some of its objectives (to identify guidelines for teachers on how to use immersive tools with their students; a needs analysis addressed to teachers and students from the partner countries; field tests on immersive games; and the creation of a new mobile application for playing immersive games for language learning).