Whew. I have never participated in an online role play before but I think I’m starting to get the hang of it. I participated as a student who believes that Google is making us stupid. It was really fun to pretend to be someone else and I was able to let my ideas flow more freely because I knew I was not sharing these opinions as a representation of myself, but rather, someone else. I argued as a student who thinks her friends are spending way too much time on the computer and I added research from articles written about this topic. I think the evidence helps support my ideas but what was really interesting to see was what everyone else in the role play had to say about them.
I really like the idea of this role play because it allows for debate which is not face-to-face. I get really nervous in those confrontational types of situations so this allowed me to feel much more comfortable with participating in the debate because it is a step back from that. My personal beliefs also altered a little as a result of this online role play. I don’t often think of this issue from the perspectives of others so it was interesting to see what the other participants had to say. For example, seeing what a Google conglomerate (Rich McMoneybags) would have to say in this situation was new to me because he would of course know everything there is to know about Google, while my character (a student) might not know all the different ways Google offers help and different tools that anyone can use.
I would definitely use a version of this in my future classroom. My favorite aspect of it is how well I think the students would engage in something like this just because it is not face-to-face. The freedom of playing a role also lets students state facts and opinions behind a sort of mask. All in all I’d say this was a very fun activity and I can’t wait to apply it in my classroom!
Megan, I think you make a great point about one of the benefits of online role-play: the distance from face-to-face confrontation. I think all students could more comfortably contribute to an online role-play discussion because 1) there is not face-to-face anxiety and 2) you can essentially "hide" behind your character (in a good way). That way, if someone disagrees with someone else, they are actually disagreeing with the character, not the actual student. I think it makes for kinder debates!
ReplyDeleteLike you, I also enjoyed reading about the different perspectives -- perspectives I had not considered before. It was a real learning experience.