Constructivism in Practice: The Case for Meaning-Making in the Virtual World

Acknowledgments

The author wishes to acknowledge in particular Dr. William Winn, Dr. William Bricken, Mr. Jeffrey James, Dr. Tom Furness, and Dr. Chris Byrne.

Without Dr. Winn’s exceptional support, this study may well have not have come to fruition. As a professor in the College of Education at the University of Washington, and as the Director of the Learning Center at the Human Interface Technology Laboratory, Dr. Winn serves as mentor, counselor, subject matter expert, and all-around good guy to a number of students in a variety of departments. It is we who are so very fortunate.

I would also like to acknowledge Dr. William Bricken’s role in starting me down the path of using virtual reality as an educational tool. Dr. Bricken guest-lectured in one of Dr. Winn’s classes on interactive technologies. In one of the most emotional, persuasive presentations I have ever seen, Dr. Bricken managed to convey the power and elegance of using this type of technology to "reintegrate the body, mind and soul in the interest of learning." I was fascinated; enough so to sneak my way into the Human Interface Technology Laboratory on the coat-tails of one of my colleagues, Mr. Jeffrey James, an established Lab associate.

In 1990, Jeff was working on his Master’s thesis on boundary mathematics. He kindly offered to share his desk and his computer with me. Pretty soon, Dr. Furness just assumed that I was on a project, which I quickly made into a reality. By the time he realized how cagily I’d entered his Lab, it was too late. I became a Research Associate the following summer, and am greatly indebted to Dr. Furness for his willingness to provide financial and professional support for five years of my doctoral program.

Last but not least, I would like to acknowledge Dr. Chris Byrne. Chris and I worked together near the beginning of the Lab’s forays into education, and she is to this day one of my favorite research and development mavens. The Brickens started the educational program, but Chris and I took it to the next level. She ran the Pacific Science Center project, in which we provided virtual world building experience to summer Science Center Camp participants. I was lucky enough to be her assistant during that incredibly long summer. She is now in R&D at Phillips Laboratories, developing educational environments, and conducting research. I thank her deeply for the female ‘grounding’ she provided in a Lab full of (male) engineers. It made all the difference in the world.

There is one other who made my project, and my years at the HIT Lab much more enjoyable. I wish to thank Ms. Ann Elias, for her friendship and her knowledge of university and College of Engineering procedures.

As for the future, I wish to acknowledge my two former HIT Lab colleagues with whom I have set sail on the commercial seas of software development; Mr. Ari Hollander and Mr. Howard Rose. To them, I say thanks for staying onboard, and may the wind be at our backs.