Goins Billy LMO Week 1 Reading Activity – Response 2 to Travis Davis

1st Paragraph from Original Post by Travis Davis

Wk 1 Reading: History of Virtual Learning Environments

“A virtual learning environment (VLE) is a system that creates an environment designed to facilitate teachers in the management of educational courses for their students, especially a system using computer hardware and software, which involves distance learning.” (Wikipedia, 2010).

Response

In a response post to Keith Lay, I remarked that one reason that education tends to be behind the technology and e-learning curve is due to the resource demands and intrinsic limitations resulting from legislations such as No Child Left Behind and Response to Intervention. As I look at your posts recount of the History of VLE’s, I’d like to consider future possibilities instead of current limitations. In future versions of VLE’s, I imagine training in virtual environments such as Second Life, where simulations take the place of more traditional methods such as lectures and textbooks. Taking that concept to next level, the idea that video game environments could potentially replace or greatly supplement textbooks (Takahashi, 2009) and even college classrooms (Carvin, 2008) is being seriously debated and discussed. To borrow a quote from Dr. Suess, “Oh the places, you’ll go.”

References
Carvin, A. (2008) Should video games replace classroom learning? Learning.Now. Retrieved from http://www.pbs.org/teachers/learning.now/2008/03/should_video_games_replace_cla.html
Takahashi, D. (2009) GamesBeat09 preview: Bing Gordon foresees games replacing textbooks at school. GamesBeat. Retrieved from
http://games.venturebeat.com/2009/01/23/gamesbeat-09-preview-bing-gordon-foresees-games-replacing-textbooks-at-schools/