Midwives and educators meeting in second life.

I have been furthering the plans for our meeting in second life to
explore opportunities for midwifery meetings, conferences and
educational opportunities.

In preparation I took my laptop to be serviced and somehow have lost
my list of friends in Second Life that I had already created. (This is
one of the frustrations of technology, sometimes it lets you down.) If
you have already offered or accepted friendship from me in Second Life
and receive another request will you please accept it, this is
important?

Plan for meeting of midwives in second life.

When:
Saturday 1st of March (Note now changed to Sunday 2nd of March)
United Kingdom -- 0800hrs
Perth WA -- 1700hrs
Brisbane -- 1800hrs
Sydney -- 1900hrs
New Zealand -- 2100hrs

Here is a World Clock with the time for this meeting in your
time
N.B. If this time is a major problem for you please let me know as
soon as possible so that I can make changes if necessary.

Where:
On Koru Island in the Kiwi educators meeting place, in the virtual
world of Second Life.
I will teleport you to this location

Program:
1. Start time, meet and greet and get settled.
This may take a wee while to get everyone comfortable.
2. 10 minute power point presentation
Highlighting some of the options currently available in Second Life.
3. Open floor for discussion
Brainstorming opportunities for midwifery and midwifery education in Second Life
4. Arrange subsequent meeting to further discussion in venue to be arranged.



Please look at my blog postings to help you understand what you need
to do in preparation for this meeting


In particular check this one to get you started

You need to be registered with Linden Labs Second life to be able to
participate.
You need to create an Avatar and go through the initial process on
Orientation Island in second life. This will take you anything from
one hour to a few hours to do. If you wish to participate you will
need to do this. Once you have done this you will need to email me
your Avatars name so that I can offer you friendship. This will come
to you in second life and as an email. You must accept this offer of
friendship in second life so that I can add you to my list of
contacts. Sarah Stewart will invite your friendship as a back up to
my list. My second life name is Dacary Dumpling and Sarah's is Petal
Stransky.


I will be online for about one hour before the meeting preparing for
it. I will be looking to see when people in my contact list come on
line and will then invite them to teleport to my location on Koru
Island. You need to accept this invitation and will arrive at the
island with myself and the group.


If you are interested please email me directly so that I can contact you clarify the process and make arrangements with you for the meeting.


Carolyn's email, cardacs@gmail.com

Facilitating online learning communities.

Facilitating online learning communities

Facilitating a meeting of midwives and midwifery educator in second life
Meeting the requirements of assignment 4

Considering what to do
As I pondered what activity I might engage in to facilitate an online learning community my thoughts went towards hosting a meeting of midwives in second life. I was introduced to second life as a part of this course and had developed a love/hate
relationship with it as can be seen from previous postings. None the less I have felt from the very beginning that there is potential here for midwifery collaboration, midwifery meetings and continuing professional development activities as well as scenario or problem based learning.

Background
I am involved principally in teaching the first year midwifery student undergraduate program at Otago Polytechnic. Our course is already delivered in seminar blocks however it is moving into a more distance based learning program next year and I will be involved in preparing this for the students. So I am interested in anything that could help to get students together to facilitate a sense of a learning community. Communities of practice have been identified as important aspects of learning in practice (Boud & Middleton, 2003: Fahey & Monaghan, 2005; Rogers, 1983; Tolson, McAloon, Hotchkiss & Schofield, 2005; Wenger, 2006). Educational researchers have also identified the importance of facilitation and community to an enhanced learning experience in schools (Roberts & Pruit, 2003) and in tertiary study (Hmelo-Silver, Duncan, Chinn, 2007). Others debate the benefits of teaching or facilitating learning which has been a feature of this course with some vigorous debates on the topic. Case, Harper, Tilley and Wiens (1994) argue that facilitating and teaching are not mutually exclusive but occur together. They suggest that teaching is facilitative when the intention of the teaching is to empower and support students. A feature of facilitation is shared control between lecturers and students over what and how they learn (Case et al., 1994). Hmelo-Silver (2006) discuss student learning as a constructive, collaborative process where students are given goals which scaffold to challenge the students at varying levels. Once students have investigated an area a small teaching sessions may be delivered by ‘experts’ who engage the students in conversation or deliver small lectures, providing rationale for the processes the students have been engaged in. Leigh has challenged us to facilitate learning as opposed to teaching. My understanding of his argument is that the two cannot co-exist at the same time. While a facilitator may also be a teacher they cannot teach and facilitate but they may facilitate a session where someone else teaches as occurred throughout this course with the small 10 minute lectures we experienced through Elluminate. I also have a interest as a rural midwife in midwifery professional development. I investigated this issue from the perspective of how midwives inform practice for my recently completed Master in Midwifery thesis (McIntosh, 2007). My findings suggested that rural midwives in New Zealand value coming together and sharing information, so this is another reason to look at the potential for second life .

We live in a rapidly changing world. Communication technology continues to advance in leaps and bounds (Leiner, Cerf, Clark, Kahn, Kleinrock& Lynch, 2003); it is hard to keep up, while at the same time, we are hearing about dwindling natural resources and increasing costs of travel around the world. In recent years we have become accustomed to conferences, with expert speakers in our field attending, and simulating interest and learning. Would it be possible to have a similar experience in Second-Life? Could we hold a conference with various workshops and plenary sessions in this environment? I had no way of knowing and decided to see if I could arrange a group of interested midwives who might be interested in exploring this further.

Planning the event
I was very new to second life and barely had the ability to move in a straight line so I approached this exercise with a high level of caution. I was very lucky to have the support of Clare Atkins one of the administrators of Koru Island and the kiwi educators meeting place. She offered to give me assistance with anything I needed, including a place for the meeting, a slide show projector and assistance with managing the whole process. This was a major benefit, and helped to make sure things went smoothly. I also had the support of my friend and colleague Sarah Stewart, who has equal skill to my own in Second-life but offered whatever support she could. Just meeting up with her a few time in second life and brain storming how the session might go and who I might invite was a huge help.

I advertised the meeting on my blog. I do have a good amount of traffic on my blog but I do not know how much of that is midwives, so I obviously needed to advertise elsewhere as well. I put a notice out on a midwifery research email list that I had recently joined. This stimulated a good amount of interest and led to a connection with a midwife from the UK (Sufia shepherd in SL) who had good Second-Life skills and was able to help Sarah and I set up a midwives group in second life. Several midwifery educators and researchers, mostly from the UK and Canada expressed interest in attending however there were also one or two from Australia, a couple from Michigan and one other midwife from New Zealand who also expressed interest. I had no idea how many might eventually make it into second life and attend the meeting. My initial attempt at setting a date was not acceptable to some as it coincided with the mid-term holiday in the UK. The date I finally settled on coincided with Mothers day in the UK but I do not think this affected attendance at all.

I made a posting on my blog very early in the planning of this event providing instructions about what to do and how to get online in Second-life. I found some useful YourTube videos which were very helpful. I followed this up with several more postings find tuning instructions regarding timing etc. I found a program on the internet which provided world times which was also very useful. I also emailed several times on the research forum email list, but I was very cautious about this as I did not want to misuse this valuable resource by making unnecessary postings. No one complained however and it has been a great way to promote the event and keep in touch with people.

I had to consider what my goals were for this event and how I was going to do it. I knew that most of the people attending would be fairly new to second life and so I did not want to be moving them around too much. At the same time I wanted them to get a feel for the potential and have the ability to interact with one another. I met up with Clare the week before the meeting and we decided that we would try using voice communication rather that typing everything. This might make the meeting flow better but would mean that not everything would be transcribe as would occur if the communication was purely text based. I wanted the meeting to be as unstructured as possible as this is the basis of facilitation, as described above. However I felt that I needed some structure given that everyone was new to the environment and I had some concern that communication might not flow. As a midwife I should have known better. Midwives do not usually have a problem communicating with one another.

Clare (Arwenna) suggested I prepare a slide for when the group arrived to help them get started with voice communication. This was a great idea and I do think it helped most participants although some my not have realised it was there. I also decided to make a few slides outlining the aims of the meeting. I believe that this still could fall within the realms of facilitation however Leigh has suggested that at this point it became more of a teaching session. Perhaps I did do a bit too much here. My initial power point was quite brief but then I thought I should perhaps add something about where my interest in this had come from, mentioning my Masters Thesis and perhaps outlining my academic credentials for this. Perhaps this was little self serving, not really necessary and getting into teaching mode.

I told everyone that I would keep an eye on when they came online and would teleport them to the venue for the meeting. I asked them to be patient if I did not get to them as soon they came online. I also prepared a list of everyone who had given me their details, Bronwyn and Debbie Corder had agreed to come along and offered to keep an eye on this for me. I am not sure but I think they may have teleported one or two in. Merrolee Penman had also said she would like to come and I co-opted her to keep notes of what was happening.

Sarah and I hoped to be physically in the same place for the meeting to offer moral support to one another. This proved impossible as the broadband at her house could not handle two computers in second-life together. We also tried the computers at Polytech but they were much too slow. This is an indication of the power and technology required to run this program.

The evening before the meeting while I was online I met up with a couple of the midwives who had hoped to come along. One from Vancouver did not make it to the meeting but it was good to speak with her then.

Finally on the day of the meeting I discovered that there was a new version of Second-Life available. I downloaded this onto both of my computers and got it running. I had two computers available to me as I was very worried about the reliability of my computer. The new version works well on my newer computer but not so good on the old one. I wonder if it is more graphics intensive

The meeting
I met Clare at the Kiwi educators meeting place and she loaded up my new slides for me. This was not without some hiccoughs and I admire her patience as I tried to get the slides renamed etc. In the end we reloaded the whole lot. There is a very small cost involved in loading slides onto second life, but it is next to nothing really.

People started to arrive almost immediately. Some seemed to teleport in themselves, but may have been assisted by Bronwyn and Debbie. Most I saw come online and I teleported them in. I had to keep my window of contacts open which limited my view of the group that had assembled. One arrived with her ‘newbies’ torch in hand, a good indication that this was her first excursion into second life. With help from Clare I managed to get everyone in and seated. Not everyone who had said they might come did but some of my colleagues from this course came and we had a good attendance.
I think I counted 15 people at one time,4 from this course and the rest midwives, educators, researchers and academics. Most stayed for the duration of the meeting, about an hour and a half.

We started off by having to do some sound adjustments. One participant was very loud but managed to turn down, it was still not optimal but it was good enough. Another popped in with some heavy breathing sounds from time to time, I wonder if this was Merrolee and her shift key? Everyone seemed to be able to hear what was being said but one or two could not speak and so they communicated through text.

Once I felt we had most people there I started off by asking everyone to say who they were and give wee bit of background on where they were from and what there interest was in second life. This is a good way to help people feel at ease and get them involved. It helps to create an environment conducive to learning (Russell and Russell, 2003). This worked quite well, as I invited people to speak I was working though the list on my contacts screen and was still keeping an eye on people who were still arriving. I missed a couple of people but they let me know that they were still to introduce themselves. After this I presented my slide show presentation. I outlined what I thought some of the benefits and some of the difficulties of meeting in this environment might be. I posed these questions to the group.
• How can we use this?
• What is holding us back?
• What is the future of second life for midwifery education and development?
• Could this be a resource for a midwifery community of practice?
I then opened this up to the group to discuss and some useful discussion did occur.
There was general agreement that the technology is improving all the time. For example using voice communication is a recent development that is making communication much easier. Educational resources in second life are expanding all the time. Problems such as time difference can be overcome in part by providing minutes and transcript.



There was a problem for at least two possibly more people who wanted to participate. One was having difficulty getting going as her system was crashing and did not make it at all. Another tried very hard to get to Koru Island but every time she arrived she crashed and had to leave. Sarah crashed her computer once during the meeting and missed some of the chat. I lost connection and had to reconnect once, which was good for me, I usually do this much more. So problems with the technology are reasonably common with second life. Everyone coming had several other contact details for me including skype, as a back up. When I lost the connection I was able to tell Sarah through skype and she told the group. So making sure potential participants can actually access second life is important but there is not much that can be done if they cannot. Providing an alternative contact in case the technology does not work or breaks down. This may limit the type of student or midiwife that could participate.

Arwenna spoke about the Kiwi educators group and gave everyone membership of this group. She also offered the space for future meetings and offered to escort anyone who wanted to stay on for a while to the Sandbox to practice building skills.

As the meeting was coming to a close most said they would like to meet again. There was mention of having some midwifery topic to discuss which might help some communicate and give a comparison with face to face communication. They also suggested changing the time around to make it easier for the North American group to attend.

Most left after this and a few went to the Sandbox with Arwenna and Isa Goodman, the other administrator of Kiwi educators. They helped the small goup of about 6 or 7 who were left to start building. Arwenna also give the group a box of landmarks to other areas.

Reflection
Overall I think the meeting was a success. I think this is demonstrated by the willingness to have another meeting. I was a bit surprised at the desire to meet again in a week. I think that might be a bit soon but we will see how this goes. Several people who did not make this meeting have said they will come to the next one.

Having someone available who has skills in second life and group interaction is a big plus and I was very lucky to have Arwenna.

I think the planned strategy of not moving around too much worked well for this first meeting, I think this helped people feel a part of the group and concentrate on talking. Some said thy liked being able to move their camera around while they were sitting and look around. Everyone seemed to manage the environment well.

The strategy of getting people to introduce themselves also worked well. Everyone got a chance to speak at least once and most joined in the later conversation.

On reflection I do think the rest of the slide show was superfluous. Had I just asked the group to talk about benefits and pitfalls I think the communication would have been improved also this would have come from the group, not me. I wonder if I did shut the conversation down by doing this presentation. It also meant I had to concentrate on the screen at this time rather than the group. Leigh has since said I was in teaching mode at this time. After a lot of thought I think I do agree with him. Perhaps I could have kept the conversation going and only used the slideshow if it seemed that conversation was not happening. As adults with considerable experience in education and/or midwifery practice this group were very knowledgeable and could easily have brainstormed these issues themselves without me having to lead them. Knowles (1990) developed the theory of adult learning described as Androgogy. According to this theory adults need to be involved in the planning and evaluation of their learning. They need to be able to experience learning and have the opportunity to make mistakes. I believe I limited this by guiding the content in this way. Friere known for his 'pedagogy of the oppressed' believed in shared learning, building learning communities. He believed that learning occurred through conversation and dialogue (Smith, 2007). I need to consider this for future facilitation, particularly with a group such as this. According to Gilly Salmon's five stage model of moderation I think I was functioning at about level 2 or level 3 for this meeting. I was very focussed on the technology and just getting people sorted. I was not really able to participate in the discussion much at all other than to encourage others to participate. I hope I can move this with the greater understanding that I now have of the medium and where I went wrong with this session and can do better next time.

I wish I had taken more time to close the meeting and make proper arrangements for the next meeting. As the facilitator I should have done this better. I also wanted to raise awareness of the midwives group in second life and did not do this.

I think the timing of the meeting for people from this course was quite good as people were interested in getting back into second life and seeing how it all went.

Plan for the future
After the meeting Clare and Merrolee gave me their notes.
Clare had added some of the verbal conversation into the text script and Merrolee had kept notes. I had to find somewhere to store these. This has led me to create a wikieducator page for the midwives second life group. I have developed this up as another online midwifery resource. I also finally managed to get a picture into wikieducator, something I have been struggling with. I put an note and link to this on my blog and also posted to the midwifery research email list.

The next meeting time has been posted on my blog, on the wiki, on the midwifery research list and through the Second life midwifery group notices in Second life. I have also individually emailed everyone I have email addresses for. On some feedback form the first group I suggested we choose a topic for this meeting and suggested normal birth as this topic. On the further reflection that I have done here, I have decided to leave this open and let the group decide when we meet. I have that up my sleeve if I need to pull it out.

Once again we will meet at the Kiwi Educators meeting place. I will open the meeting and invite the group to set the agenda. Arwenna had prepared a few places where the group can break off into small groups to have a chat if they wish. I will teleport these groups to these locations to save them all having to walk, or fly, there if they are struggling with moving around. I will leave this very much up to the group this time and see how this goes. I would like the group to identify what they think we could do with this group in the future. I will introduce them to the second-life midwives group and the second-life wiki. I will try to get email addresses from those for whom I do not have these details and will try to get plan and time for the next meeting.

References
Boud, D., & Middleton, H. (2003). Learning from others at work: communities of practice and informal learning. Journal of Workplace Learning, 15(5), 194-202.

Fahey, C. M., & Monaghan, J. S. (2005). Australian rural midwives: perspectives on continuing professional development [Electronic Version]. Rural and Remote Health, 5. Retrieved 25th June 2006 from http://rrh.deakin.edu.au.

Hmelo-Silver, C. E., Duncan, R. G., Chinn, C. A. (2007) Scaffolding and achievement in problem-based and inquiry learning: A response to Kirschener, Sweller and Clark (2006). Educational psychologist, 42 (2) 99-107

Knowles, M. S. (1990). The adult learner: A neglected species. Houston: Gulf Publishing Company.

Leiner, B. M., Cerf, V. G., Clark, D. D., Kahn, R. E., Kleinrock, L. L., & Lynch, D. C. (2003). A brief history of the internet. Retrieved 26th June, 2004, from http://www.isoc.org/internet/history/brief.shtml#Origins

McIntosh, C. (2007) Wise women's web, rural midwives communities of practice. Unpublished masters thesis. Dunedin, Otago Polytechnic.

Roberts, S. M., Pruitt, E. Z. (2003) Schools as professional learning communities. Thousand Oaks: Corwin press. Available online

Russell, L,. Russell, J.(2003) Leading change training. American Society for training and development.

Smith, M. K. (2007) 'Paulo Freire and informal education', the encyclopaedia of informal education. [www.infed.org/thinkers/et-freir.htm. Last update: December 28, 2007]

Tolson, D., McAloon, M., Hotchkiss, R., & Schofield, I. (2005). Progressing evidence-based practice: an effective nursing model? Journal of Advanced Nursing, 50(2), 124-133.

Wenger, E. (2006). Communities of practice, a brief introduction. Retrieved 29th December 2006, from http://www.ewenger.com/theory/index.htm

Todays midwives meeting in second life

See the second life midwives wiki for information about future meetings in second life.


We had our second meeting of midwives in second life today. I was great to meet up with three midwives from the North American continent and one from Australia. Thank you to you all for coming and also once again to Arwenna for helping us all out and to Sarah for also coming along and supporting.

| View | Upload your own

I would love to add audio to this slide show but do not have time at the moment.

We struggled at the start of the meeting to get audio working and gave up in the end just communicating through text. This is quite a challenge with a group and I am doubly glad audio worked for us last week. We also had problems for some with getting connected at all and Sarah crashed out of second life once while I crashed and had to resume four times. Others did not seem to crash. The sexual health area looked very interesting but there were lots of scripts being offered to us all the time. if we had been communicating in voice it may have been OK but trying to communicate in text when lots of other text was appearing all the time was too much really. Arwenna's garden and cave are quite magical places and a real pleasure to see.

On reflection for a group such as ours I think second life does hold tremendous possibilities for collaboration and networking. I think these possibilities are yet to be realised. I would not feel happy at this stage to use second life to meet with students as i do not feel it is reliable enough and would cause some anxiety for students. At this stage I would prefer to use software such as elluminate to have meetings with students. Given the pace of development in second life I believe that the time when it is more suitable for meeting with students is probably not far away. I therefore am happy to continue developing my skills in this environment.

It was disappointing that none of the others from last week made it. Understandable though given our busy lives. I have not organised a further meeting at this stage and will wait and see if there is support for this. I will go online on Sunday Mornings around 0900hrs NZ time 1200hrs Saturday Second life time as often as I can at Koru Island Kiwi educators sandbox, (Koru 161, 212, 34 PG - Koru Sandbox). I can then practice building while I am waiting. If anyone turns up I will be happy to see them. I will wait for a little while before logging off. I am not around every weekend however as I often have midwifery locum work in the weekends.

PLEASE COMPLETE THE SURVEY ABOUT SECOND LIFE AND MIDWIFERY EDUCATION
See the side bar of this blog or the bottom of the Midwives in Second Life wiki.
both lead to the same survey form. It is simple and easy and should not take long to complete.

Midwives meeting in second life.

Having had a meeting in second life with my friends, supporters and mentors, Petal and Arwenna my plans for the midwives meeting in second life is moving along. We discussed where we might hold the meeting and decided on Koru Island, the New Zealand educators island. Arwenna is an owner of this place and Petal and I are members and are able to hold meetings here without cost. Arwenna has a screen onto which we can load power point presentations, she thinks we might also be able to organise a screen to stream a video into second life. This is starting to feel much more 'do-able' now. So the plan for the session now is;

Participants log onto second life and I will send an invitation and teleport them to the Koru Island meeting place. (to do this participants need to have registered in Second Life, negotiated Orientation Island and moved to Help Island on the mainland. See my previous blog post.



Meet at the Koru Island meeting place. This has an area where we can sit around in a lovely New Zealand setting with New Zealand trees and bird song in the background. We can sit here and watch the power point.

After this I would like to stream a video if this is possible.

We will then have an opportunity to talk about possibilities the participants envisage for using second life for midwifery education, continuing professional development, conferencing or networking. Might be able to brainstorm, find some uses and answer some questions people have.

If we have the opportunity we might finish off by visiting another virtual place where there is already a midwifery education space. I still need to be able to arrange and confirm this.

Things I need to do now.
Prepare a power point which illustrates aspects of second life.

Try out some options for recording the session

Prepare more information to guide the participants into second life and to Koru Island.

Keep those who have expressed interest in the loop and encourage them to register with second life and go through the Orientation island process.

Finalise the exact date and time. The meeting will be on the weekend of the 1st or second of March. In the New Zealand evening, UK morning.

We have a second life midwives group

We now have a second life midwives group. Today Sarah (Petal) and I(Dacary) met with Sufia (a Uk midwife) in Second life. This was on a UK education Island, not sure which one). Sufia has been in Second Life for about one year now and has more knowledge about it than Petal or I. We met in a church that her husband has been creating. That is him on the right.

We managed to get voice communication going and we were able to actually talk to one another which was fantastic. Sarah and Sufia (SL name)had a lot in common as they had both been involved in establishing email lists for midwives in the past. The international midwifery community is really very small and it is not too hard to come up with people that you know in common.

Sufia also took us to a conference area on this Island and explained that the billboards can be changed to have postings which are more suitable for midwives or educators or whoever the group is that is meeting at the time. I do realise that I still have lots to learn in Second Life. It took a long time for me to get my voice activation going as I had lost the buttons, which are usually on the bottom toolbar, and had to reset them. With Sufia's help I managed to do this. For a while I was just there, while the others were talking, and I could not participate, a bit of a frustration which people who are struggling with getting to grips with second life might not be able to tolerate. It is quite a learning curve but I am becoming increasing convinced that it is worth the effort, to be able to collaborate and communicate in this environment.

If you are keen to join the Second Life midwives group you will first need to join second life. Then search for groups and request to join the group. Perhaps one of the things we can discuss when we all get together is how we might use this group? Will we have regular meetings of the group and where might these take place? Does anyone have any ideas about this?

One of the really exciting things is that Sufia's husband is quite skilled in construction in second life and Sufia herself has also been building. Sufia's husband, Vidz Ah, is creating the Church in the first photo here. This could be useful if we decide we need to construct a place for midwives, and if he is willing to help.

Second life midwives meeting

Our midwives and midwifery educators meeting on Koru Island in Second life is this Sunday. We will be meeting in a New Zealand bush setting, with New Zealand bird song in the background. We have a large screen available for a brief introductory presentation before we discuss your ideas and questions about Second Life.

Sunday 2nd of March
United Kingdom -- 0800hrs
Perth WA -- 1700hrs
Brisbane -- 1800hrs
Sydney -- 1900hrs
New Zealand -- 2100hrs
Second life time -- 2400 hrs 0000 hrs or (12 midnight)

Here is a link to world times for the meeting.




It is not too late to register with second life. Create an avatar to enable you to participate in this international collaborative meeting of midwives and midwifery educators in Second life. There is information and 'how to' videos on my blog which will help you to do so at this link Let me know your Avatar name and I will add you to my friends list in second life. I will then be able to teleport you to the meeting place when you log on.

I have been busy working with my mentor Clare Atkins (Arwenna Stardust) in second life arranging this meeting. My friend and colleague Sarah Stewart (Petal Stransky) has also been supporting me and will help me to facilitate this meeting. I am also expecting one or two of my colleagues from Otago polytechnic to help with technical difficulties or to help answer your questions about meeting and learning in this environment.

Looking forward to seeing you on Koru Island :)

Progress so far toward facillitating an online learning community in second life

As I progress towards meeting the requirement of my third assignment for the Facilitating online learning communities course I need to blog where I am at with this at present and how I have arrived at this point.

I have been developing a growing love hate relationship with second life since I first joined as Lala Aluveaux, a persona that I no longer use since I lost my head.

As I considered what I might do to facilitate an online learning community I started to think about a virtual birthing centre. I managed to find a place where women can experience virtual pregnancy, but nothing about midwifery education. On the 4th of February I posted a message on the forum for discussion on midwifery and reproductive health research [MIDWIFERY-RESEARCH@JISCMAIL.AC.UK]. this is UK based but has an international following of those interested in, and involved in midwifery research.

This email received a good response and there are a group of around 7 midwives from the UK, Australia and New Zealand who are interested in participating. I created a blog posting to help people who are not currently in second life to get started. I have also sent another message through the midwives group about possible dates. I originally picked the 26th or 27th of February however this conflicted with mid-term break in the UK and so have changed to the 1st or 2nd of March as the most likely date.

My most recent blog posting explained how Sarah an I went into second life and met with one of the midwives who has expressed interest in this and together we have created a second life midwives group.

Plan at present is:
*)Spend a little more time with Arwenna and get a bit more skill in second life myself
*)Firm up a location for our initial meeting in second life
*)Plan where to go from this location, I hope to liaise with a Uk midwifery educator who already has a virtual birthing/learning space
*)Arrange a programme for the meeting, what we might discuss

I think an important part of this initial meeting will be to firm up another time to meet together so that we can all progress an online group of midwifery educators developing online learning, networking and conferencing resources in second life.

If anyone reading this post is interested in joining us please leave comment or email me at cardacs@gmail.com with your name and SL name and I will add you to my list.

Last night before the midwives meeting

I arrived home tonight from a visit to my Mother-in-Law to find several more midwives signed up with second life and ready to participate in our meeting tomorrow night. Very exciting! Some of my colleagues from Otago Polytechnic and the "facilitating online learning communities course' that Sarah and I are completing are also going to join us. One of these is a colleague from Occupational therapy at Otago Polytechnic who has been a leader in blogging for this profession and has developed quite a community of OT bloggers. My mentor in second-life, Arwenna, who has helped me with setting up my presentation and other aspects of second life, will also be there helping me out, thank goodness. I hope she, and some of the others with more skills in second-life than myself, will be able to help answer some of your questions.

The meeting is tomorrow night at 2100hrs -NZ time 0800hrs-UK time 0300hrs-Montreal, 0100-Edmonton, Midnight-Vancouver. Midnight-secondlife

Hope this is helpful, here are the other word times for this meeting.

When people arrive I will teleport them to the location for the meeting. There will be some displays with one or two helpful 'how to's' to help get you started communicating. I will ask everyone to give brief introduction about their professional background and interest in Second-life. I have a small presentation prepared to introduce some of the possibilities I have discovered in Second-life and where my interest arises. I will then open the floor to everyone to discuss their thoughts about this medium and how it might be used for the benefit of the midwifery profession and midwifery education. I am hoping we can get people communicating in voice however if this is too difficult we will revert to text communication. When communicating in voice online it is important to watch for the signal above an avatars head, indicating that they are speaking. Trying to have one person speaking at a time is important. We will need to discuss these ground rules before we all start trying to communicate. Participants will be able to also communicate by text even if we are communicating with voice. Thankfully Sarah will be there to help me too. Hopefully between the two of us and with Arwenna's help we will be able to keep ahead and eye on communication and make sure everyone gets a chance to speak. I also want to try to keep some minutes of the meeting and might be able to delegate this task to one of my friends.

After the meeting if people want to go together to explore another second-life environment we might be able to do this, although it may be a challenge to get everyone moving together. If there is enough interest we may be able to arrange a future meeting before we leave. I also hope to get a photo of all participants if we can manage this.

Next meeting in Second life.

See the second life midwives wiki for information about future meetings etc.

The time is fast approaching for our next meeting in second life. It has been pointed out to me that although it is Sunday morning here and Sunday evening in the UK it will actually still be Saturday in North America so something for you to remember.

Times are Date: Sunday 9th March in New Zealand

Time: 09.30am NZ, 3.30pm New York, 8.30pm London, 0530 am Perth (sorry :)), 0730 am Sydney, 12.30 pm Vancouver.

Place:

Meeting in second life at the Kiwi educators meeting place on Koru Island (Koru 155,122,27 (PG)-Koru)

I had thought about breaking into discussion groups and brainstorming a topic at this meeting but on further reflection would like the group who meet to decide what they want to do. So will leave it very loose at the moment. Arwenna has been preparing lots of possibilities for us.

More information can be found at the Second Life Midwifery group Wiki
Please don't leave until we plan where we go from here, how often we meet etc and also until I have you all signed into the midwives group of second life, if you want to of course.

We made it. Midwives met in Second life

Thanks to everyone who who supported this initiative and came along to our midwives and educators meeting in second life on Kiwi educators Koru Island. I am still feeling a bit tired so just a brief feedback from this session at this time and I will write more comprehensively later.


I am particularly grateful to the following people
Claire Atkins (Arwenna) has been wonderful supporting me to learn more about second life. Setting up the slide show and redoing the whole thing at the last minute when I wanted to change things. Claire also helped me keep an eye on the crowd and helped me to make sure everyone had a chance to participate. The meeting would not have been nearly as successful without her.

Merrolee Penman (Koru Bracken) . Merrolee is and Ocupational therapy lecturer and is a leader in blogging for that profession. She also has an interest in exploring Web 2.0 uses in tertiary education. Merrolee was keen to come along and I co-opted her to keep some notes, rough minutes, of this meeting. She did this job superbly for me. I will finalise these soon and post them in Google docs, linking here very soon. These notes of the meeting are available now in Wikieducator with a link also to the transcript of the meeting which is available in google docs

Sarah Sewart (Petal Stransky) who has encouraged and supported me to get to this point. Sarah came along and contributed to the conversation keeping this alive when I was busy concentrating on other things.

Brownyn (Branwen) and Leigh (leeroy) who ran the course on 'facilitating online learning communities'. I have learned so much from this course and would never have explored second life at all had it not been for this course.

The meeting was a great success, most particpants were from the UK, one came from Michigan where it was 3am when the meeting stared. Arwenna and her co-owner of Koru Island Isa Goodman gave everyone Kiwi Educator status which means they cna return here and can practice constructing things here also. We have been welcomed to return and hold further meeting here. Everyone was keen to meet again in one week. It was suggested that we make it Morning for NZ and evening for UK. This would make it midday or afternoon in North America and a better time for North American residents to participate. There were several midwives from North America and Canada who were interested but were not able to attend. I had met one Trinny Dreamscape from Vncouver a little before the meeting. also met up with Aastra Apflebaum who had difficulty with her computer crashing in second life. She popped in and out a couple of times but had to quit in the end.

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Here is the slide show presentation that I gave to the group to initiate discussion about the usefulness of second life for professional networking and midwifery education.

Thinking about midwives in second life

I have just returned from a walk up the river with my dog. He is a Clumber Spaniel just in case you are wondering and he is called Buster.
As Buster and i were walking along I was pondering the meeting I had in Second Life this morning with a couple of midwifery educators, one from Canada and the other from America. We had a really nice time, just the three of us. We went dancing on Koru Island. We listened to music, communicated through text and watched our avatars dance. We were all amazed at how good it felt and from my perspective it increased our connection and comfort with one another enabling us to communicate more freely.



Sudbury, Lisachris and I cavorted across the dance floor and did some amazing maneuvers. We spoke about possibilities of meeting with students in this sort of environment. We also discussed how we had been searching for places in second life where our students might be able to learn some midwifery skills. We had been looking for clinical spaces for students to learn some of these midwifery skills. This was a preoccupation of mine when I first came into second life and is something that has concerned me since then. My thoughts on this are changing and this was one of the things that preoccupied me on my walk with Buster.

Internationally there is a great deal of concern about rising intervention in birth In Australia in Florida and here is another from Australia, with some good discussion about the problems of caesarean, and this from my friend Sarah . There is lots and lots more on this and easy to find.

So we are concerned about this and many of these posts suggest that midwives are the answer. Midwives are the guardians of normal birth. Midwives can support women to avoid caesarean section. I believe the problem is that many midwives, who are receiving their midwifery education in this time of increasing intervention and rising rates of caesarean section, never get a chance to see women outside the clinical environment of a hospital, or perhaps an clinic type birthing centre. Those who have been fortunate enough to care for women in their own homes, even if they do not birth there, will know that there is a whole world of difference. This virtual environment, of Second Life, provides us with the opportunity to give our midwifery students a totally different environment. I believe many midwives are frightened of stepping outside the walls of the medical establishment. They are worried and concerned about how they might cope without the security they perceive within these walls.

I think the ideal birthing centre in Second Life already exists and I believe it is called Arwenna's Secret Garden. (I am not sure if Arwenna would agree though), somewhere very like this anyway. Imagine working with a woman who is labouring in this environment. Supporting her as the intensity of the contractions increase. Affirming her ability to do this job. When she feels the birth is near there are several places to go. There is a small hut with mats on the floor or there is the lovely rock pool. If there are problems we can talk with our colleagues in the medical establishments if we need to. If the labour was not going so well we could liaise as we would in the real world and transfer the woman to the hospital with all the bells and whistles. This would be great learning for our students. Supporting normal and helping the woman to birth in a lovely peaceful setting observing in case intervention is required. Talking with medical colleagues and supporting the woman as she transfers to a medical establishment and maybe continuing the care in this environment.

When I first came to New Zealand and for about 10 years I worked in Rangiora Rural Maternity Hospital. while I was there we created a small, peaceful, private garden for labouring women. More recently I have worked in Balcutha and Lumsden. All of these have private outside spaces where women can labour in a peaceful garden setting. This is not so unusual in rural maternity units in New Zealand.

Why should we recreate the medical environment that we know increases intervention in birth? Is it not more appropriate for us, as midwifery educators to try to give our students a sense of how it is to care for women outside this clinical environment?

I am not suggesting that this type of scenario based learning is just around the corner. I think as educators we have a lot more to think about and learn before we are ready to start supporting student learning in this environment. But we do need to think about what we want for our students when we are ready to do this and I do think this will happen. We could also be talking with our medical colleagues about how they see this working and the learning opportunities involved in inter-collegial communication. I do not believe that the profession of Obstetrics is happy about the rising caesarean section rates either, but normal birth is not their specialty it is ours. It is for us to support the normal and consult appropriately. This is the real way forward I feel. Mutual support and respect for the place and skills of the other, while keeping the woman and her choices at the center and as the focus of care.

I look forward to your thoughts and comments on this.

Progress in my online facilitation for assigment 3

I put a call out through this blog and also on the midwifery research list from the UK. The result is that I have a few people who are interested in looking at brainstorming issues for midwifery education in second life. So I am feeling that this much more possible now than I did previously.
Most of those who have expressed interest are also quite new to virtual worlds and some I think will be coming into second life for the first time. So there will not be a lot of expertise in this regard. I am also very new to this and have solicited the help of Claire Atkins (Arwenna Stardust) to help me with the technical side of things.
Clare has taken an interest in the facilitating online learning communities course and has helped several of us novices begin to find our way in second life. She is also going to help up-skill me a little in preparation for the big day. Many thanks for all your help Clare. I copied this image from Arwenna's blog, hoping she doesn't mind.

Sarah (Petal Stransky) and I (Dacary Dumpling). That is Petal on the right and me on the left. Went into second life yesterday and had a look around a conference site at Jokaida. We have different abilities and inabilities in second life. I am better at moving around, (I think Petal's legs are just too short really) and Petal has mastered teleporting others and inviting friends. Together we might be able to work something out. One of the people who has responded is involved with a project at Coventry University, where a virtual birthing room/meeting place has been established in the virtual place they have developed. I am hoping that we might be able to visit there to see what is happening and help to gain a better understanding of the possibilities, particularly for collaboration.

I have not set a date or time yet for the meeting. I think the 23rd or 24th of February looks like the most promising dates at this time. It should be either an early morning or evening meeting. At this time I am thinking it will be an evening meeting for us and a morning meeting in the UK.

Second life and flexibility in learning

I have also posted this on my other blog
As you know I have an interest in second life and have been considering the educational potential of this virtual world for students. When we have students who are at a distance from one another I think second life could be useful for collaboration and establishing a sense of community. It does require a good internet connection however and also a good quality computer. I was perusing the internet today and found a conference presentation delivered by Sarah Robbins “Intellagirl”. this presentation gives a great overview of second life as an educational tool. She also describes the characteristics of the average student population and how this is evolving. It is a worthwhile view when considering flexible course delivery and presents some excellent arguments about why learners need flexibility in courses. Click on the view presentation on the page linked to conference presentation. When I played this video it stalled half way through, I managed to fix this by fast forwarding a couple of times and it started to play again. It is wise to stop the video from playing and allowing the whole thing to load before trying to play it. This will allow it to play without stopping and starting, which can be annoying.

Another very interesting aspect of this presentation is the Medialandscape player which is the software application through which it is delivered. This plays the video and also presents the slide show alongside. I am hugely impressed with this tool and would love to learn more about it.

By the way I have a whole new look in second life, this is me now.

Pushing up daisies in second life

Last night I was in email contact with on online friend/mentor/colleague expressing my frustration and not having a home. She (Arwena Stardust) then helped me to set my home to Koru Island, the Kiwi educators second life island. I am so pleased I finally feel I belong somewhere. Also if I do get into a tricky situation in second life it is much easier to run away if your have a home to run to.

After getting me sorted with my new home Arwena taught me how to start building things in second life. This is not something I had anticipated doing. I thought I would leave this up to others with more skill. Very quickly though she had me pushing up daisies. I made a box, flattened it and added a texture of daises. This is the basis of how things are created in second life. So maybe I will have a bit of a play and see what else I can create.

Image: Daisy from Bigtallguy's photos on flickr.com

Want to join me in second life

I will now post a series of videos her about second life, what it is about and some 'how to' videos.

This video is a good introduction to second life in education.


If you would like to explore this further here are a couple of helpful videos.

This video tells you how to go about logging on to second life and creating an avatar.


The first avatar I created was the female fox as I did not like most of the other avatars. However I really did not like my fox avatar either. I discovered after entering that it is possible to change your body shape and clothes. I preferred to have a more human shape.

This video steps you through what happens when you first enter second life


If you are interested in joining me you will need to go through this initial process on orientation island. After you have done that I can send you a link to teleport to the place where we will meet.

Using blogs, wikis, elluminate and secondlife in midwifery education and professional development

I have already explored the use of blogs and wikis in previous postings, however my thoughts on the usefulness for these tools continues to grow as I use them more and learn through this use. Sarah discovered that it is possible to create a blog with multiple users at blogspot. A lecturer could establish a group blog for a group of students. Students can then be encouraged to blog about a topic they are investigating or reflections on learning activities they are engaged in. This would provide opportunities for informal learning and provide students with experience and tools which could benefit them in future midwifery practice and facilitate life long learning opportunities.

For midwives currently in practice group blogs might be a useful tool for sharing practice information and share experience and evidence for practice. Rural midwives might feel that this is particularly beneficial for them, providing opportunities for sharing not otherwise available.

Wikis have potential for groups to explore a particular topic in greater depth. A group of students or midwives could commence a wiki on a topic such as group B streptococcus perhaps. Each person can independently access the same document and add content or make changes where new evidence comes to light. This collaborative process could be used for developing group presentations or reaching consensus on treatment options.

Elluminate provides the opportunity for midwives or students to come together from a computer in their own home or a local source such as a library internet cafe or maternity facility. Synchronous discussion can occur through talking or text message. Also course material or powerpoint slides can be shown on a whiteboard online at the same time. Larger groups can also be broken off into smaller groups to brainstorm particular issues. A good internet connection is required however. Although this can be accessed through a dial up connection some material may take a very long time to load.

I have been thinking a lot about second life today following my last experience there. I am not sure whether all of the things I have been considering would be possible. Perhaps those with greater knowledge could enlighten me. I believe that there are a number of uses for SL for midwives and midwifery students. I am about to fly to Auckland for a training day in real life. Midwives are traveling there from all over the country, this is logistically difficult to organise and very expensive. In second life these people would be able to come together. Powerpoint presentations could be delivered and discussed in real time. Participants can converse and share their thoughts and experience in real time. Experts could deliver real life video lectures through this medium. This must be more cost effective than getting everyone together form all over the country.
For undergraduate students there could be many learning applications for SL. Lectures could be delivered with real time discussion to follow. There is actually a physical presence to interact with. There is also an opportunity for scenario based learning . A particular scenario could be established. The students could be given information and could then make choices about the action they might take. This would lead the student to pass [teleport]to another part of the scenario where the consequences of their choices could be explored and further choices offered. Use of animations and graphics could make this very real and give a feel for the real life aspects of the issues which are explored.

The downside to all of this is getting everyone comfortable with using these web 2.0 tools and the time it would take to prepare and deliver some of these things, particularly the graphics etc for second life.

There are also many other applications such as you-tube videos which can present skills for students to view in their own time. Slide-share presentations which can either be viewed on the site or loaded onto blogs and many more tools which are sure to be used in the future.

I feel very privileged to have had the opportunity to explore and consider these various tools and resources through the facilitating online learning communities course. I would love to hear from midwives, students or fellow lecturers about how they feel about these resources. Do you think these could be useful to you? How do you feel you could use them?

Assessment one

Facilitating online learning communities course assessments.
Assessment one:
For assessment one I was required to discuss the characteristics of online learning community and the implications for learning and teaching, evaluate online communication tools relating to midwifery education, articulate the skills required for maintaining a successful online community and summarise the ideas experiences and understanding of at least three other participants in the course about facilitation.

I believe I have met the requirements of this assessment in the following posts
Wikieductor
Now I hate to moan
Thoughts on wikis
I found the following quote
Working on wiki
Thinking about students’ blogging
Video conference
Bloggers teachers and learners
What have I gained from this course
Reflections on Derek Chirnsides 10 minute lecture
Rural midwives wikispace

Further reflections on curatorial teaching and second life
Second life again No I’m not really crazy I’m just exploring learning communities
Using blogs wikis eluminate and second life in midwifery education
Teaching or facilitating learning
Learning communities online
Enhancing student learning in second life
Looking through these postings once again I am reminded of the roller coaster of learning that I have traveled in the last few months. As well as all the social networking tools I have discussed in these postings I have also explored other resources such as facebook, bebo, ning, and many more. The tool that I have really fallen in love with is this blog. Through this I have met others with an interest in midwifery and womens health. I have communicated on the blogs of these others and they have commented on mine. I have a small network of people with whom I communicate on a fairly regular basis. In other words I have a small community of contacts that I did not previously have a connection with. I have also been using this blog as a repository for information or evidence I have gathered which may be of interest to my students. I plan to continue to use this blog and to discuss with students how we might be able to develop blogs in which they could record their learning experience and connect and communicate with each other.

Through this course I developed a midwifery wiki page on wikieducator and a rural midwives site on wikispaces. Neither of these have stimulated much interest in the midwifery community. However the rural midwifery wikispace has been regularly visited although there have been no comments or edits to this and the wikieducator page has been accessed over 1,000 times.
This is one of the challenges for developing a learning community in an online environment. It seems that people will willingly visit and peruse material online however encouraging them to actually engage with it and contribute is quite a challenge and takes a great deal of thought. As Gilly Salmon states, when considering online course we need to always keep the needs of the learner in mind rather than the technology. The course needs to be "designed for student activity rather than delivery of content". I believe that this is a critical point. It is through this activity that the students will learn.

How to engage students and encourage active participation is the challenge of a learning community. In this course I have been an active participant and through this participation I have learned a great deal. This occurred also with the support of other members of the course. Being able to share ideas and seek help and support from other course participants has greatly added to my learning and helped me to identify with the other course participants as a learning community, although I have never actually physically met with most of them. The shared learning goal of getting to grips with social networking tools has been the bond that has kept us motivated and communicating with one another. I have been pleased to re-establish links with some of the course participants as we are returning to work after the holidays.

I believe that the learning community we established was definitely facilitated through the 10 minute lectures with guest speakers and the discussions that we engaged in as a group through "elluminate". This seemed to me to be a very useful tool to bring everyone together and emulated a class discussion in a way. In some ways I think this could actually be even more interactive than a class discussion with the ability to use the whiteboard to type and draw (there were some strange creations which appeared) and for others to see this. In a way it is like everyone seeing your doodle pad and being able to add to it and share it while listening to a lecture. This has the potential to be a fun way to learn and to simulate thought and discussion. However I had problems with my internet connection which was very frustrating and I can imagine that this would be a source of frustration for students I am working with. As a group we learned that you need a back up plan for times when the technology lets you down. Have an alternative method of communication or an alternative activity for the students to engage in. Of course this requires more thought and organisation for the teacher. Delivering courses in an online environment is not going to be time or money saving I feel, however it does have the opportunity to be more accessible to more people.

Exploring second life for education

I have been looking at Second life in preparation for a meeting of midwives. I have been struggling to find good places to go to. When I search in second life I only seem to come up with some very 'dodgy' sites, not the sort of places i really want to hang around in.

I finally did a web search for slurl (which is second life urls) and found a really good wiki with lots of interesting places to explore. I also went to Leicester Universities Media Zoo. Which was very interesting.

This is a slide share of my experience

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Virtual midwives meeting this Sunday

Sarah and I are very excited and looking forward to welcoming you all to Koru Island meeting place in second life this Sunday.
Follow this link for world times for the meeting



Hopefully everyone who is interested in this has now downloaded second life onto their computer and has created an avatar for themselves. Email me at cardacs@gmail.com with your avatar name and I will then be able to connect with you in second life and transport you to the meeting.




I will be online at least one hour before the meeting preparing and will log anyone that comes on over the weekend into my friends list then. I will be away from home until Sunday afternoon so will not be able to do it before then.

Just in case there are technical difficulties with second life, an alternative online contact option is through Skype. These are contact details for Sarah and myself through Skype


Skype name
Carolyn - carolynmcintosh
Sarah - sarah.m.stewart

See you on Koru Island Sunday 2nd March 9pm NZ time.

Virtual midwifery in the "Mommy and Me clinic"?

What a strange experience I have just had.
Those who have followed this blog will know that I joined second life a wee while ago and have blogged about some strange experiences before.

I started my adventure this evening by reading about midwifery awards from the Royal college of Midwives UK. Two midwifery educators received an award for a virtual pregnancy teaching package they developed. This is something that has been on my mind ever since I ventured into this other life of social networking, virtual worlds and all the web 2.0 paraphernalia. so I did a search for virtual pregnancy and found this recent blog post about second life birthing clinics.

So I went into my second life persona "Dacary Dumpling" and searched for a birthing clinic and teleported to Mommy and Me clinic. I was fortunate enough to meet Noble Barnes.
He is a graphic designer and is the person who has built all of this. When I first arrived I sat at a computer console which has a brochure that informs about what is available here and made some notes. I was informed that the chief doctor here is a doula and student midwife. Now I know that this is an American site and midwifery is maybe not autonomous in this part of the world but why would a doula, student midwife want to call herself a doctor??? Sorry Noble, you were very kind but I do find that very strange. You do not have complicated pregnancies here, the virtual women push the virtual babies out by themselves. Lets get real here and let the midwives do what the midwives do at least in this virtual world.

Noble told me that this virtual birthing center was established so that women who cannot have babies in real life can have this experience in the virtual world. Couples can choose what sort of pregnancy they want, they can have a single baby of any colour or twins or, strangest and scariest of all, a furry baby or a wolf baby. Well that really threw me so much so my computer froze and I had to reload. He showed me the tummy he has developed called the tummy talker which the woman wears. She and her partner can pat it or rub it or sing to it and they can see the baby move.

Then he took me to the clinic room. In here they weigh, measure, take blood pressure and perform ultrasound (3D of course). He performed one on me and I saw the typical 3D face on the screen. (I don't know what you would see if you were carrying a wolf). I could also hear the foetal heart. After this he took me to the birthing room. They have a shower with a bar to hold on to. When my Avatar held onto the bar it moved rythmically up and down, there is a similar bar on the wall in the room. Their is also a birth ball to sit and rock on. There is a deliver bed (like a theatre bed) which is where the babies are born at present. He took me through a birth. I jumped on the bed and my body was moving and pushing. Lying semi prone and every now and again gave a wee jump with the hips. (I didn't notice any sound effects here). Eventually the baby moved down through my pelvis and out. Noble told me Avatars cannot birth in the shower currently but they are working on that and also plan to have a birth pool.

I was thinking about the possibilities of scenarios for students and clearly it is a possibility to create something like this, as Noble said it is not the purpose of this center. He felt that such a thing is a possibility. However I can see that what they have done has taken a considerable amount of work and although it may meet the needs of the people who go there it will take a lot more to get something that is useful as a learning tool for midwives or health professionals. To do something like this would need a collaborative effort, with midwifery educators who have a very clear understanding of what they want and computer graphic experts who can interpret this into useful interactive imagery. Still it is a step on the road and much further than I imagined we might be.

Many thanks to Noble Barnes for spending the time to show me around. I do worry a wee bit about people who might have deep psychological problems and how they might handle this sort of virtual experience. Is there some sort of help or support for someone who just can't handle the experience? It is all just a little bit strange.