Peer Reviewed Journal via three different mandatory reviewing processes, since 2006, and, from September 2020, a fourth mandatory peer-editing has been added.
Educators, researchers, and online courses designers are
increasingly investigating the use of 3-D shared virtual
worlds for online education. This paper discusses the
importance of social interaction in e-learning. We present
the idea of using Second Life, a 3-D shared virtual world,
in online courses. The researchers investigated the impact
of using Second Life as a learning environment and a
communication medium in online courses. We measured
the extent to which the completion of a learning task and
the communication in Second Life can enhance the elearners’
perceptions of social interaction via a self-report
questionnaire. A prototype application called The Village
of Belknap was developed by the Delphi Center of
Teaching and Learning at the University of Louisville.
The study compared the perception of social interaction of
e-learners who participated in Second Life sessions with
the perception of social interaction of e-learners who did
not participate in the Second Life sessions. The results
indicated that the use of Second Life has a positive impact
on experiencing a high perception of social interaction in
online courses.
