Call for Papers
2nd Global Conference
Monday 12th March – Wednesday 14th March 2012
Prague, Czech Republic
Interest in virtual worlds and their application to learning has increased dramatically in recent years. They play an increasingly important role for people in both social and work-based contexts, and they challenge many of our assumptions about how we work, teach, learn, and relate to each other. There are many different types of virtual worlds and they are used for a multiplicity of purposes including gaming, play, social networking, learning and development, work, and even business. The experiences gained in virtual worlds impact who we are in the physical world, and vice versa. What are we learning through those experiences and how transferable is that learning from one domain to another?
The main aims of this conference are to increase our understanding of experiential learning in virtual worlds, to examine formal and informal learning in such worlds, and to critique both their essential characteristics and future possibilities. For the purposes of this call for papers, we define virtual worlds as 3D, immersive graphical environments representing realistic or imaginary worlds, in which users are co-presented as animated characters (avatars) and interact with each other and with the worlds’ contents. However, we recognise both the complexity and contested nature of experiential learning in virtual worlds and welcome papers that challenge this definition.
This conference will be of interest to educators, researchers, students, independent scholars, trainers, virtual world users, and anyone interested in what happens in virtual worlds and what it means for us as human (or virtual) beings.
As it is such a broad subject area, Experiential Learning in Virtual Worlds precludes a definitive list of sub-topics, but the following list is indicative of the kind of topics or themes envisaged by this Call for Papers:
- Art of building a virtual persona
- Arts and entertainment in virtual worlds
- Assessment in virtual worlds
- Blended learning approaches
- Case studies of experimental projects
- Communication modes and etiquette
- Conflict in virtual worlds
- Education and training in virtual worlds
- Emerging technologies within higher education
- Identity and citizenship in virtual worlds
- Immersion and presence in virtual worlds
- International technology challenges
- Online communities, formal and informal
- Play, fun, fantasy and horror in the virtual world
- Psychology and affect in virtual worlds
- Role switching between traditional and virtual organizations
- Scenarios, simulations, role-play and experimentation
- Serious games
- Sexuality and (in)appropriate behaviour in virtual learning worlds
- Skill development in MMORPGs
- Teaching
- Technology convergence
- Types of virtual worlds
- Understanding mortality in virtual worlds
- Virtual and global teams
- Virtual world pedagogies
- Work-related learning in virtual worlds
Papers will be considered on any related theme. The Steering Group also welcomes the submission of pre-formed panel proposals. Papers will be considered on any related theme.
300 word abstracts should be submitted by Friday 30th September 2011. All submissions are minimally double blind peer reviewed where appropriate. If an abstract is accepted for the conference, a full draft paper should be submitted by Friday27th January 2012. Abstracts should be submitted simultaneously to the Organising Chairs; abstracts may be in Word, WordPerfect, or RTF formats with the following information and in this order:
a) author(s), b) affiliation, c) email address, d) title of abstract, e) body of abstract f) up to 10 key words
E-mails should be entitled: Experiential Learning in Virtual Worlds Abstract Submission.
Please use plain text (Times Roman 12) and abstain from using footnotes and any special formatting, characters or emphasis (such as bold, italics or underline). Please note that a Book of Abstracts is planned for the end of the year.
All accepted abstracts will be included in this publication. We acknowledge receipt and answer to all paper proposals submitted. If you do not receive a reply from us in a week you should assume we did not receive your proposal; it might be lost in cyberspace! We suggest, then, to look for an alternative electronic route or resend. If an abstract is accepted for the conference, a 12-20 page full draft paper should be submitted to both Organising Chairs by Monday 27th January 2012.
Organising Chairs
Jim Gritton
Senior Lecturer in Leadership and Management
School of Health and Social Care
University of Greenwich
London, United Kingdom
Rob Fisher
Network Founder and Network Leader,
Inter-Disciplinary.Net
Freeland, Oxfordshire OX29 8HR
United Kingdom
The conference is part of the ‘At the Interface’ programme of research projects. It aims to bring together people from different areas and interests to share ideas and explore various discussions which are innovative and exciting.
All papers accepted for and presented at this conference will be eligible for publication in an ISBN eBook. Selected papers maybe invited for development for publication in a themed hard copy volume(s).
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