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From Crimson Parrot to Air Gondwana
The Crimson Parrot was the whimsical name that Professor Des Butler gave
to the scene of a fictitious bar-room brawl that was at the centre of one of
the first attempts to use computer technology to teach law. Des had in mind
a real Brisbane bar of the early 1990s, the Red Parrot, but thought that Crimson was a more appropriate adjective for the mayhem and bloodshed of
the CD-ROM-based scene that students had to explore from a number of legal
perspectives. But Des and his colleagues, Geraldine McKenzie and Ian Wilson,
had to recruit actors, both for the brawl and the subsequent trial, from
students and other colleagues who were gently persuaded to explore their
talents as celluloid thespians.
Today the technology has moved on and the most recent online scenario-based
teaching program, Air Gondwana, is integrated into QUT's Blackboard online
teaching program and uses Second Life software to create a virtual
environment. The pedagogical uses of the program have also moved on from the
multiple choice questions of some of the earlier programs to provide
formative feedback and a range of sophisticated role-playing opportunities
for students.
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