As discussed in previous postings, the Counsellor Education in Second Life (CESL) group hosted the Third Virtual Counselling Conference (3VCC) between the dates 14 - 17 September 2011.
It involved an international community of counsellors interested in:
- Using virtual worlds as a delivery platform to present counselling related topics (not necessarily involving virtual worlds) to an international community, without the time and cost factors involved in international travel;
- Exploring the role virtual worlds do or could play in:
- Counsellor education
- Continuing professional development
- Networking
- Formal meetings of various counselling related groups
- Sharing of a range of resources:
- In-world tools
- Journals
- Books
- Workshop materials
- Exploring the ethical issues relevant to changing technology and therapy
The 3VCC Program Schedule can be viewed at: http://sl.counseloreducation.org/styled-2/index.html
A PDF file of the 3VCC Worshop Abstracts can be viewed at: http://sl.counseloreducation.org/resources/3vcc-Program.pdf
Also have a look at John Wilson's videos http://www.onlinevents.co.uk/index.html . John also has a service where people can observe the vitual web events as a live video without participants having to come in as an avatar in-world.
John also has a YouTube Channel you may wish to explore: http://www.youtube.com/user/wilsoncounselling.
Stay tuned, some video extracts from the 3VCC are on their way.
Just a little digression. I will get back to sharing about the 3VCC shortly.
I just want to share with you about an animation website I have come across recently, called Go Animate. It is very easy to use. You choose a number of characters, choose the voices for each character and type in your dialogue for each. Sometimes you need to play around with your words and punctuation to get the dialogue to sound natural, but it doesn't take very long to do.You can animate and move your characters as well. The site has both free and paid memberships.
I thought I would experiment and create two videos relevant to counselling. I think Steven Spielberg's job is very safe! lol, but I think the animation site has a lot of potential.
I am very much the novice here, but thought I would share it with you.
Clip 1: The Danger of Why Questions: http://goanimate.com/movie/00pIgDXWr2HY?utm_source=linkshare&uid=0bt2iZCm4Gcs Don't forget to use full screen.
Clip 2: Fighting Demon Thoughts - Part I: I tried to be creative about negative self-talk here. There will be other clips, but at this stage it looks like negative self-talk is coming from a demon-like character. The later clips will reveal how the "demon" is negative self-talk within the individuals, the heroes of the clip, and will lead into some useful cognitive strategies to address this.So it is a work in progress. The volume for the "demon" needs to be better at times, but as stated before, I am just dabbling at this point: http://goanimate.com/movie/050aTBkS6K1k?utm_source=linkshare&uid=0bt2iZCm4Gcs
I thought I would start with some of the lighter "stuff" at the conference - dancing and fireworks!
Thanks Marty, it was great fun. The dancing animations lined up very well with the inworld radio link.
The concept of dancing was a peculiar one for me when I first came into Second Life. But having participated in a number of dances and firework sessions post-conference, I can really vouch for their fun, as well as the networking which ensues. It was a spectacular way to finish the conference. Being able to fly up into the colour and patterns of the fireworks, without injury, was fun too!
Greetings!
The next few postings will be about the Third Virtual Counselling Conference (3VCC) which was recently held in Second Life, hosted by the Counsellor Education Second Life (CESL) group. It was a wonderful conference. My only regret was that work commitments and the need for sleep curtailed my full attendance! But next year, I will make sure nothing is booked on those days. And being downunder means that my days and nights will be swapped, but it will be worth it.
Thank you to Dr Marty Jencius & Debra London for a wonderful opportunity. I have appreciated their hard work over the last three years. A thank you to all those guest speakers as well. The professional development and dialogue they have created has been excellent.
It was great to see the support from the American Counselling Association too! Although I am located in Australia, it is encouraging to see how professional organisations are supporting such ventures in these new frontiers.
Counselling in virtual worlds certainly raises a range of ethical concerns and issues which are well worth considering, with regard to client work. So, the input from people such as DeeAnna Madfes and Kate Elize Larnia from the Online Therapy Institute http://www.onlinetherapyinstitute.com/ is always invaluable at these conferences.
We are all committed to the safety and empowerment of the client. Keeping an open mind and continuing with that professional dialogue means new directions will emerge. Technology certainly poses many pitfalls for us, but also provides many new opportunities, It is an interesting labyrinth to explore. So the balance between ethics and technology will be an ongoing challenge.I look forward to future discussion with regard to this.
However, putting client contact aside as an issue, virtual worlds offer a range of opportunities for the international counselling community to meet inworld and to participate in conferences, workshops, meetings and general networking, such as that which occurred at the 3VCC.
Stay tuned, as I will upload a few video snippets of some of the 3VCC sessions.
