Avatars

Hi, I am Xan's avatar. I was created at DoppleMe.com absolutely free! May I tell you a little bit about how me and my avatar friends can support your e-learning?

One thing we avatars can do for your e-learning is create a social feel to an otherwise lonely learning module. Adding avatars, like me, to your e-learning is also known to make your modules memorable, and therefore increase the effectiveness of the learning opportunity.

You can employ avatars like me to support students as they navigate through a course, provide feedback or coaching to the students, and you may even decide to allow the students to create their own avatars that will interact with others in a classroom or adventure game setting. Avatars have been said to be better than real teachers because they do not make mistakes which live instructors make. For example, have you ever had a student ask a dumb question and you struggled not to make a weird face? I don't make weird faces!! The student can go on thinking what their grandparents told them, "there are no dumb questions."
Now, I'm a pretty simple avatar. I don't talk. I don't move. I'm not in 3D. But some of my avatar friends are! So you can be as fancy as you want with avatars in your e-learning creations.

There are many many avatar creation programs available. Search online until your heart is content and see what you find. Tom Khulmann also describes how he add characters to his online creations in his blog.

Your turn to talk:

• What great avatar creation programs have you found?


• In what ways have you used avatars?

One last thing, may I tell you where Xan found all this information about me and my avatar peers?

Bailenson, J. (2008, April 4). Why digital avatars make the best teachers. The Chronicle of Higher Education. Retrieved from ERIC database.

Jaay, A. (2010, September 16). Better training results with AlterEgos and Camtasia Studio. Retrieved from http://newbizine.com/better-training-results-with-alteregos-and-camtasia-studio/. (2010, October 17).

Slotte, V., & Herbert, A. (2008). Engaging workers in simulation-based e-learning [Electronic version]. Journal of Workplace Learning, 20(3), 165-180.