My Take
I enjoyed using the tool and I think students will find exercises that use this VR tool both fun and educational. There would be a learning curve to familiarize a class with the tool. I wonder whether a classroom group could use the tool without risk of distractions from student verbal comments during the sessions? The learning would be most likely be the most effective if completed on an individual basis. To move these types of tools forward in education resources or libraries will be needed to provide software use with more traditional lesson activities.
How I Use It
I used a set of cardboard VR glasses with the Google Cardboard(R) app on my iPhone(R) to review several VR presentations. I would definitely use this tool to show students the world. Everyday the world gets smaller, but there are so many beautiful places to see. Specifically I would use this tool to link historical education with VR visits to the sites. I have found that visits to historical sites brings a much deeper understanding to the history. There are details and relationships that can only be acquired through a visit to a historical location. VR provides an window to seeing a site as if present. This approach would extend the learning from materials available to a classroom to an active engagement. Assessments could be developed to determine how the tool contributes to the deeper learning that could occur through visiting a historical site.
A potential learning approach (once the class is familiar and competent with the tool):
- Background materials on the topic in more traditional learning environments
- Assess the student learning
- Based on the assessment of learning of individual at this stage the VR exercise could be assigned
- Re-assess student learning after the VR exercise to determine learning enhancement