Future XR Classroom? Yes, please!
What are TWO important things you learned or insights you gained about any of this week’s topics? Provide enough detail to explain the relevance or why they are important. You cannot just include terms or phrases from this week, you must EXPLAIN them.
One thing I learned about this week’s topics was that knowing how to use Virtual reality is necessary for the workforce nowadays. In the article “Virtual Reality Comes to the Classroom” Beth McMurtrie writes that “These are the job skills students are going to need. They’re entering fields where these technologies are being used” (McMurtrie, 2019). With how much society uses technology and depends on it for everything it would make sense that VR would start to gain traction as a skill needed in different fields. This is why we should start educating students on how to use VR in the classroom with virtual field trips, making projects with it, and teachers teaching with it. Students could get exposure to it and get used to it so when they enter the job force they will have some experience with it. Some fields use technology more than others. I would say being a future teacher you need the skill of knowing how to use these technologies so they can enhance student learning. People who are in the military use VR to train and perform experiences similar to that of war or combat so future students who want to go into the military could go into a field that uses VR to train. Many jobs use technologies in their line of work and we need students trained in them.
Another thing I learned this week was about the challenge of implementing XR in the future classroom. XR is extended reality. It includes an environment that can blend physical with virtual or can give a completely virtual experience like with Virtual reality or Augmented reality. In the “2020 EDUCAUSE Horizon Report ™ Teaching and Learning Edition” it is stated that “The use of XR must also “fit into instructors’ existing practices, and the cost cannot be significantly higher than that of the alternatives already in use” (Educause, 2020). This is difficult because some teachers are so stuck in their ways that they do not want to include VR and AR in the classroom. Or they do not know how to use it or implement it because they did not grow up with this type of technology. I think to solve this problem we can have new training on how to use and implement VR and AR into the classroom for current teachers to be educated on. Future teachers like me should have to take a course on technology in the classroom that includes how to use AR and VR and the ways it could be used in an educational setting. Some teachers do not think technology is an important part of their teaching practices but maybe teaching them about their potential benefits might open their eyes. Also, schools do not get enough funding already so it would be hard to incorporate technology like AR and VR in districts where there is no money for it. Technology like AR and VR should be included in school budgets from now on because you would not have to pay for school buses and lunches for students that go on field trips with AR and VR.
How do you think augmented reality or virtual reality technologies will continue to evolve into the future? Will they create any new opportunities for learning? Will they pose any new challenges for learning?
I think they will evolve more and more especially because of Covid. Covid does not really let us do social things/events anymore so I can see something like VR or AR being used for us to have social interaction again. Like Peter Clark said in the “‘Pokemon Go’ Creator on Augmented Reality’s Massive Potential” article, “He said that the future of AR would be far more beneficial if it involved everyone around, and if they could share in the same experiences. As an example, he described the many “Pokémon Go” events that bring together people all over the world” (Clark, 2019). Maybe games like “Pokémon Go” that have events for social interaction can be the future of us getting together and being social together but safely. I remember when “Pokémon Go” first came out, my whole family played and we would talk about the Pokémons we had and did not catch. We would go Pokémon hunting together and it made us bond. We had fun even if it was silly. Games like “Pokémon Go” could maybe be reworked to be more VR that shuts out the physical world and its problems like Covid. It would be awesome to go Pokémon hunting with my family again but in a VR way instead of AR because AR makes us have contact with the real world.
A new opportunity for learning that AR and VR can create is like a virtual field trip with Tour Creator from Google. You could go anywhere despite the cost it would normally take to go to places like Rome or Egypt. I am a future teacher and I think this would be so cool and fun! I would love for my students to see historical places. They could learn more about history by being in these historical places than reading about them. We could learn more with VR and AR than a textbook talking about history! Textbooks make it hard to imagine with many details but with VR and AR you could take it all in. You can observe all the details. Visual learners would love this option instead of reading.
