Holiday Storytelling in AltspaceVR

We’re pleased to announce that Educators in VR is a part of the support team for the Holiday Storytelling community event series in AltspaceVR this year. We need your help to fill up social VR with holiday stories, traditional and original.

This event comes at a very unique time in our history and societies. Holidays are a time for the gathering of families around food and tradition, a time when the stories of old and new are shared. Hanukah has started, which should be bringing families together around the world for the Jewish holiday. The United States is a quarantine away from Thanksgiving (2 weeks). We’re fast coming up to Advent in December, then Winter Solstice, and just over a month away from the Christmas holidays.

With so many this year isolating and far from family, we will break that isolation in social VR. Now is the time to gather together in a more intimate way than an online conference. It’s easy. A headset is appreciated but not necessary to access. AltspaceVR is now accessible with Windows 10 in the Microsoft Windows and Steam stores. It is available for the Mac in 2D. Bring your family and friends together in VR.

This is also a great opportunity to work with students of all ages to encourage them to tell or share their own holiday stories in VR.

To participate, find a holiday story that is preferably in the public domain, or share your own unique holiday story. It may be done in any language. Please state the language in the title or first line of the event description to attract an audience in that language.

1. Create a 30 minute event in AltspaceVR.
   • Have at least one moderator for the event in addition to the reader(s). Requests for moderators are to be made in the AltspaceVR Discord > Events > #moderators-needed channel with the hashtag #storytelling.
   • Choose a template from the AltspaceVR offerings or build a world for telling the story, ensuring the Diagnostics are all green.
   • Instructions for creating events are found in AltspaceVR in the InfoZone or ask for help from anyone with a green (Community Helper) or gold (staff) border around their name tag.
2. Post a link to the event with the hashtag #storytelling in the AltspaceVR Discord > Events > #promotion channel.
3. If you would like, also post a link to the event in the Educators in VR Discord > #workshops channel.

If you, your family, your class, and/or students would like to join us in spreading the joy of storytelling for the holidays, the specifications are in the Holiday Storytelling Guide (PDF).

The following are storytelling events already set through the season in AltspaceVR. Check the event and the AltspaceVR Events Calendar for the time in your time zone.

• Twas the Night Before Christmas:
  • December 17
  • December 19
  • December 20
  • December 23
  • December 24 – I
  • December 24 – II
• Polar Express:
  • November 27
  • December 5
  • December 12
  • December 19
  • December 24
• Creative Writing Meetup Writers share their Holiday Storytelling original works:
  • November 29
  • December 13
• How the Grinch Stole Christmas:
  • December 6
  • December 13
  • December 18
  • December 20
  • December 23
  • December 24
• Christmas at Red Butte and other Holiday Stories:
  • December 18 – I
  • December 18 – II
  • December 24 – I
  • December 24 II

Come join all of us by creating your own holiday storytelling event. Or bring friends to the ones you will soon find filling the AltspaceVR event calendar. We’re eager to hear your stories from wherever you are in the world and in your life. Please help us celebrate the holidays together in VR.