knowledge transfer ?

Summary
As I never got to actually organizing the workshop I had been pondering on, I’ll limit myself to writing down considerations on the workshops I attended. I was very keen on learning how my fellow MUVEnationers would solve the problem of transferring knowledge in SL, this being an unfamiliar (uncommon) environment.

Situation
I have not been too particular about the subject for workshops; anything would do to learn about teaching in SL. Prerequisite knowledge has been slightly above my level in several workshops, but I always managed to follow the story.

Task
Attending the workshops, I set myself the task of establishing to what degree SL skills influence the competence of bringing over a message and of inviting a student to learn things.
As I have not always been in a situation to meet with the prerequisite knowledge for the workshops, my findings also tell about my shortcomings in capturing the lesson. In a few situations I had to concentrate so much to be able to follow, that no time was left for looking at secondary issues in the setup of lesson and class. Extra SL skills would have helped here, I suppose.
In other workshops, I was over skilled. This made it easier for me to spend time on judging the coherence of the story brought by the instructor. Gaps in the story can make it difficult for a student to shape a line of thoughts that bring understanding. That would discourage him, I should imagine. No teacher wants discouragement to bring the students to shift their attention to the overly present (and lurking, as Anna Begonia put it) temptations of both SL and RL.

Actions
The main thread in the lesson often was a beforehand prepared notecard, read/spoken by a Speak Easy HUD in the openchat channel. This is very good for both instructor and student. The instructor can hold to the structure he prepared for this the lesson. De student can scroll back in his communication panel whenever he needs to have another look at what has been said before. On top, keeping a log of chat in SL, he does not have to think about taking notes. Working over the conversation text, later on, is enough.
Stressing some points, going deeper into some things (as need arises) can be easily done in the same chat channel. The colour difference in the text tells you the comments from the original explanation.
Preparing the notecard has proved important. First of all, the text needs to be applicable in most circumstances. If by chat, during the lesson, you need to disagree with too many text lines, no more structure is left in the lesson. Secondly, text lines need to be short and easily chewable. If deciphering the message takes too much trouble, a student has no more attention left for any other stimulus presenting itself.
Often used as well, was a screen for presenting textures/slides. This is, of course, a very welcome tool to visualise the message, brought only textually otherwise. A pity though that often, you need to be particularly handy with your camera tools to look up from your work piece (or anything else), to the screen, and back. In a bigger classroom or with two whiteboards being used, this is not easy. Needing their time to keep up with the pace imposed, some students may end up sticking to just the chat, the notes, whatever. On I-don’t-remember-what island I saw a tool with HUD for switching most easily from one defined view to another. It may be worth while to try this out with a view-on-the-whiteboard, a view-on-the-teacher, any other view.

Results
Giving class in SL, can turn from rigidly ordered intentions to a very unstructured, tea-party like chaos. A bunch of students not being well-groomed and/or not apt to learn from you, need no more to decide to (go and) do other things. As in RL, the teacher’s enthusiasm is a key factor in setting up a good lesson in SL. I have seen much of that quality too, in the workshops I attended.

Lessons learned
Student’s interest in the event and in the subject of the course is important for teaching, in SL as well as it is in RL. All this does not come by itself: SL does not help in this. Advantages of teaching in SL, must be sought elsewhere.
Also, teaching for an audience with a different level of skills, is no other in SL than in RL. As in RL, for solving that, you must allow one student to help an other. A quicker student has time to spare and can (pride himself in) helping out the slower student. Also, after class, students must be provided with enough material so as to be able to organise the knowledge in their own head, at their own pace.