Overview
of the Pedagogical Uses of MOOs
A MOO, or
a MUD (multi-user Domain), is a virtual environment in which participants
can speak, express emotion and conduct, and navigate their way through
an online world. Originally designed as virtual environments for
role-playing games called dungeons, MOOs have evolved into spaces for the
construction of diverse cyber-communties.
In addition
to purely recreational or social uses (MOOs tend to blur these kinds of
divisions), MOOs can serve a wide array of educational purposes.
A MOO, for instance, serves as an ideally suited creative writing environment
for many reasons.
-
MOO environments
foreground the use of language to construct identity and character behavior.
-
MOO environments
foreground the role of collaboration in the generation of art and the development
of knowledge. In the most literal of ways, the MOO's epistemology
is political, social, and always contingent.
-
Additionally,
MOO environments allow teachers and students to engage in the same kinds
of discussion and activity common to a traditional creative writing classroom.
The Creative
Writing Classroom we have developed at Diversity University, for example,
features the following virtual tools:
-
Virtual tables
where students can conduct small group workshops in which only they and
the teacher may participate.
-
A virtual blackboard
that anyone in the room may read by typing "look bb."
-
A virtual composition
notebook in which students may post creative writing and append revision
comments to the postings of other students.
-
A tutorial presentation
on generating creative ideas.
For more information
on MOOs, please visit the
MOO page at Eric Schwerer's site or these
MOO tutorials. If you've read enough and feel ready to get
your cyber-feet wet, please visit our Creative Writing Workshop in the
Literature Hall of the English Building at Diversity
University (object # 25198) or any of these other
MOO environments.