Amy Bruckman. (n.d.). Retrieved March 12, 2006, from http://www-static.cc.gatech.edu/~asb/.
I know I’m supposed to be reading about MOOs but I’ve also been exploring them. Right now, I’m trying to figure out how to board the elevator at MediaMOO. I was able to get on the train. I also ate some cheese and put on a costume in the women’s dressing room. Very fun!! However, I need to get a better handle on the verbs. I’ve figured out look and read and I was able to push the button to get the elevator to come but couldn’t get on.
Here’s my main question: have people moved away from MOOs? MediaMOO was celebrating its eighth birthday but that was in 2001. Is it still active? I don’t think I qualify to join since for now I am not doing research into media. (Probably soon, though.) But I wonder if these communities become too hard to maintain. They take a lot of start up and attention. And…I’m pretty sure there isn’t one presentation here at VSTE about MUDs or MOOs. The focus this year seems to be on blogs and podcasts.
I’ve also started reading about “constructionism”: “My research applies the “constructionist” philosophy of education to the design of online communities. Constructionism advocates learning through design and construction activities — learning through working on personally meaningful projects. ” (Bruckman, n.d.). This is obviously different from “constructivism” which has to do with constructing new knowledge based on a learner’s schema. Since she’s from MIT, I’m assuming this goes along with Seymour Papert’s ideas about logo and lego. What do we learn when we “make” things and what is the definition of “make”?
