VR’s characteristics can be described by “3I”, namely, Immersion, Interaction and Imagination. The sense of immersion refers to the degree to which learners feel the virtual environment. The closer the virtual environment is to reality, the stronger the sense of immersion will be. Interactivity means that learners can operate on things in a virtual environment and get feedback as if they are in the real world. Thinking conception refers to the use of computer technology to construct the same environment as reality, but also to construct the imaginary space, to broaden the scope of users’ experience and enrich the types of experience.
Improve Learners’ Creativity
Due to the particularity of VR technology, usually in reality not dare experiment can experience in VR environments, unlimited change reagent dosage, or a bold attempt to incorporate different reactants, only unexpected, no can’t do, this attempt to breakthrough can improve the learners’ creativity.
Breakthrough Time and Space
In traditional teaching, the time and place of teaching are relatively fixed, and for abstract knowledge points, teachers can only present their images through oral presentation or multimedia. However, the emergence of VR technology breaks the boundary of time and space, and teaching activities can be carried out at any time. At the same time, VR visual and specific teaching can put the abstract concept, learners can be observed in a few minutes of teaching time life growth trajectory, and the composition of molecules and atoms image can also be observed visually, and even the universe can object in his hands, learners can completely into the VR technology created by the context.
Support Sustainable Development
In traditional teaching, the experiment is a consumptive teaching activity. To enable learners to better grasp the reaction principle, most schools often need to invest a lot of money to buy experimental equipment and materials, and the experimental products are difficult to be reused. After the emergence of VR technology, it can greatly alleviate the financial and material input of schools. Schools only need to introduce corresponding VR equipment and create the virtual environment and virtual experiment supplies required for teaching, so that learners can enter the virtual laboratory for learning. This learning method effectively saves teaching costs.
No Unified Standard for VR in Education
2016 is known as the “first year of VR”, which refers to the beginning of things. For VR, “the first year” means that major mainstream manufacturers have successively launched VR products for ordinary consumers, and global technology companies have successively set up the civil VR industry. With the transformation of VR technology from high-end to civilian, the application of VR technology in the field of education is also more extensive. At present, many well-known technology companies have developed VR products for the field of education, and some domestic universities have also set up VR LABS. VR technology has taken root and sprouted in the field of education, but there is still no standard for VR application in teaching. It is difficult for well-known enterprises and universities to connect their VR products with other VR products, which reduces the compatibility of VR products.
Hi Jiahao,
Thank you for your post and sharing your thoughts. If you consider VR and where it might be most effectively used, what contexts or subjects do you feel it might be most useful for and why?
Sincerely,
joe
From a long-term perspective, I would say VR is suitable for curriculum which needs to construct/reconstruct scenes. To me, VR is the best way to bring those impossible virtual scenes (famous historic events, the bottom of the ocean, etc.) to students. For now, implementing VR into the classroom as a teaching and demonstrating tool is better and much easier than as a developing tool for students (a relatively low “user learning cost” is the key).
Hi Jiahao, hoping everything goes well 🙂
Thank you for sharing your thoughts on VR.VR can not only break through the traditional teaching in which teachers can only present the knowledge points to be taught by oral expression or multimedia, but more importantly, as you said, many experiments that dare not be carried out in reality can be experienced in the VR environment, which must have historical significance for the development of science. There is a big disadvantage in the application of VR technology, that is, VR products are very expensive. However, just like Google Glass you introduced in class, more and more VR products have become more accessible and acceptable. Therefore, I believe that the popularization of VR technology in education will surely be within reach.
Best,
Sheng Li