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Poster presented on March 6-8, 2002 at the conference on Communicating the Future: Best Practices in Communication of Science and Technology to the Public, co-sponsored by the U.S. Department of Energy Office of Science, and NIST. Poster topics were selected as "best practices" through a formal peer review by a committee of distinguished science writers, educators, and researchers. SciCentr
and SciFair: Online Virtual Worlds for Informal Science Education |
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Abstract Our goal is to found and support a hands-on virtual science center that exists only in cyberspace and to build a community of users engaged in its programs. World development is a team-based activity that takes place in a secure online multi-user environment that allows the teens, undergrads, researchers, and experts to work together from distant locations. We are now focused in two areas: development of 3D interactive, multi-user exhibits in SciCentr, a virtual science museum, and a related after-school program for teens that takes place in SciCentr's sister world, SciFair. We have found through
preliminary evaluation (pre/post tests, questionnaires, and chat log analysis)
that the youth are intrigued by the technology AND that they acquire information
about the organization and its research interests through participation
in SciFair programs. In addition they have the opportunity to interact
with excellent role models and to acquire new technical skills. Implentation
System: Server, Interactive Engine, Browser Community: mentors, content experts, technical support Beginners
Toolkit: Budget:
The first SciFair team, twelve teens at rural Spencer Van-Etten High School in Chemung County, New York, comes "inworld" to learn about bioengineering of crops, and to be introduced to a new online digital medium. Their project, the Tomato Islands, is a series of virtual greenhouses that comprise a knowledge space where they display what they have learned about the crop's biodiversity, cultural requirements, history, biogeography, and modern production. Future topics include, among others, the implications of bioengineering.
In June, 2001, 9 teens
and their chaperones with the Cornell Cooperative Extension's 4H Youth
Development Career- Explorations Program came to CTC to work with an undergraduate
mentor to explore and contribute to SciCentr/SciFair. These youth from
all over N.Y. State spent two days learning how to work in the environment,
working in teams to create two exhibits on asteroid belt research, and
presenting their exhibits to European educators in the world and their
peers at the final convocation. Research and Evaluation CTC has been evaluating the medium and our content from the inception of the program based on the responses of youth and educators brought on site for demonstrations and now through examination of such data as chat logs for the SciFair mentor sessions. We have recently recieved funding from the National Science Foundation for development of a prototype exhibit on Transposable Elements, that will support collaborations with Andy Phelps at RIT's IT Lab on gaming interactivity, and with Bill Winn at the University of Washington's HIT Lab for evaluation of learning.
Expand Your Horizons:
4H CAREER EXPLORATIONS: Post test results from a workshop held in June, 2001, show that we achieved good learning outcomes for teens with no prior experience with the technology or prior knowledge of CTC. Approximately half the group had studied asteroids in school. Contact Website Back to Best Practices home page Back to Best Practices posters page Created: 7/17/02 |
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