By Alice Cavallo on December 22, 2009 3:15 PM
| Permalink
Virtual Forum Theater (VFT)
is a computer-based learning experience that allows face- to-face,
computer, and multimedia-based drama. VFT has three parts: VFT
the toolset, VFT the creative
activity, and VFT the performance. The VFT toolset is a
multimedia tool for the creation of dramatic plays using audio, and images that
enables participatory and collaborative digital playmaking through the Internet.
The VFT activity or process is the collaborative process of creating a
digital play, and consists of much more than the VFT toolset, including
dramatic exercises involving group bonding, social awareness and Improv skills.
A VFT performance refers to the activity of watching and responding to a
previously created digital play. In practice, the distinctions between these
parts of VFT become blurred; many times a performance becomes a creative
activity.
VFT integrates image, audio and text and was
conceived as a tool for collaborative creations and remix with basic
educational goals of improving argumentation skills and expressive fluency in
disenfranchised children and youth in developing countries such as Brazil. I developed, tested, deployed and
researched it in the context of my PhD on education, technology and drama at
Tufts University.
VFT Screenshot
