Go back to Case Studies menuJan Rune Holmevik and Cynthia Haynes, Lingua MOO
My interview with the creators of Lingua MOO took place online "in the MOO." We had virtual coffee together and chatted for about an hour and a half. While discussing their work, Jan Rune Holmevik and Cynthia Haynes showed me the books they'd written and the Web sites they've developed, and they took me on a guided tour of the MOO "facility." Jan was in Norway, Cynthia in Texas, and I in Hanover, New Hampshire. At the end of our interview, Jan emailed me the transcript of our interview, some of which is excerpted below.
A MOO is one of the many forms of communication possible on the Web. According to Jan, a MOO is "a synchronous online multiuser space. It was originally developed for online gaming and socializing purposes, but since about 1993-95 it's been used more and more for academic learning purposes." A MOO environment is different from an asynchronous online discussion because it takes place in real time. A MOO is unlike a chat because, in addition to real-time dialog, a MOO is immersive: users move around a virtual space and can build rooms and create objects. Says Jan, "A chat is functional and flat in comparison."
Sarah asks, "But why do you use a MOO? How do you use it in your teaching? What is a typical class session like?"
Cynthia says, "I use MOO as a supplement to traditional teaching, and a typical class session varies, but usually in the beginning I have students discuss something as a group or in small groups. This gets them used to the environment and sets up the conditions of possibility for substantially 'different' ways of interacting. Then I get them used to viewing the MOO as their primary work environment."
Sarah asks, "Can you say more about 'different'?"
Cynthia says, "Different in the sense of how this space encourages more reticent students to speak up, in the sense of how this space breaks down racial and gender cues (or can). Then the class discusses how the MOO changes how we think of each other, and how 'identity' figures into how we interact."
Jan says, "It's important to keep in mind that this is not a Web site, it's a lived space with a window to the Web."
Cynthia nods at Jan.
Cynthia says, "Students are encouraged to set up a space here, to build their own world and to see this as a lived space where they become part of a community."
Cynthia is assistant professor of literary studies and director of rhetoric and writing at the University of Texas at Dallas. She uses the MOO and the Web in such courses as Rhetoric, Textuality, and Technology, and Electronic Expression: Writing, Reading, and Virtuality. At the University of Bergen in Norway, Jan uses the MOO for his Digital Culture and Object-Oriented Programming courses. They started building Lingua MOO in 1995 as a pilot program for a freshman rhetoric class and now both use the MOO and the Web extensively in their teaching.
Sarah says, "Would you give me a 'for instance' for classroom use? I am having trouble imagining how you would incorporate this into a classroom session."
Cynthia says, "Let's say you have assigned your students some readings on sexual harassment. You want to record their discussion of the readings and have them read that as a follow-up, to see how they interacted and what they had to say."
Jan says, "Let me add to that example. In the MOO you could also easily have your students enact their discussion through role-playing and thereby engage in a deeper experience of the texts they are reading."
Sarah asks, "How would you do that?"
Jan says, "Well...by setting up a situation and have male students play females and vice versa: give them some starters and see what happens. The beauty of it all is that the students will be writing a whole lot and expressing themselves through writing without even thinking about it."
For Cynthia's rhetoric and composition courses, using the MOO has changed the way she looks at the process of writing - specifically, at how she evaluates student work.
Sarah says, "Do you notice improvement in writing?"
Cynthia says, "It depends on what you mean by writing :)....I think this kind of writing is something teachers may have trouble seeing as productive discourse, but if students can see how much they write, and if it counts as writing, which I think it should, then we begin to value other genres of writing and interactivity equally. Plus we encourage teachers to build into their assessment of the student the notion of 'activity' as much as the 'writing products' we are used to grading."
Jan has much of his class activity take place in the MOO. For example, he invited Victor Vitanza, author of CyberReader, to meet with his Digital Culture students in the MOO. He also uses the MOO for meetings with students. "Since they are in Norway and I live in Texas part of the year, this has worked out really well."
Because of its multidimensionality, the MOO has great advantages for online collaborative work. During our interview, for example, Cynthia and Jan "showed" me things by causing them to appear on my screen. We looked mostly at the Web sites we were discussing, but for collaborative group work, students could share and discuss such things as texts, images, and multimedia.
Sarah asks, "Why did you start with MOO? What did you see in this particular technology?"
Jan says, "interactivity"
Jan says, "it's a social learning space"
Cynthia says, "a community"
Jan says, "collaborative"
Cynthia says, "fun"
Cynthia says, "in real-time"
Jan says, "yep :)"
Sarah exclaims, "Okay, okay!"
Cynthia giggles.
Jan grins.
It was fun. And it is clearly a terrific tool for collaboration at a distance. In the MOO, I had a chance to meet Jan and Cynthia and see their work, and I had a transcript of our conversation to refer to later. Also, I was surprised to find that I had gained as much a sense of these people who were thousands of miles away as I would have had we been sipping coffee at the café down the street.
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From Web Teaching Guide
Copyright 2000 Sarah Horton
LinguaMOO
Copyright 2000 Jan Rune Holmevik and Cynthia Haynes
lingua.utdallas.edu