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2024-04-02There is no better way to learn something than through experience. Virtually any teaching philosophy will concur with that statement. In fact, many career choices - from medicine to heavy equipment operations - require hands-on experience before a student can be considered ready.
But what happens when first-person experience is not easily attainable, be it for efficiency, logistical, or monetary reasons? One solution that’s been gaining traction in recent years is Virtual Reality.
Virtual Reality in education
Virtual Reality (VR) has been taking off in education, and an increasing number of schools and institutions are adopting the technology into their curriculums and trainings.
It allows students and trainees to learn things in unconventional, immersive ways. For example, a classroom of students learning about the Seven Wonders of the World could travel to these monuments with no need to leave their classroom!
Reasons to use VR
Research into the use of VR in education dates as far back as the 1960s, when it was used in flight simulators to train military pilots. In “A conceptual basis for educational applications of Virtual Reality”, W. Winn outlines the key reasons to use VR in education. Here are his main points:
Immersive VR provides first-person experiences that are designed specifically for educational support - experiences that cannot be obtained through conventional formal education.
Constructivism, the theory that knowledge is gradually built through experience and social discourse, provides the best support for the educational application of Virtual Reality. The amalgamation of the two is what allows learning to be improved: by permitting learners to immerse themselves in a given topic, instead of relying on abstract sources of information, like textual descriptions.
Virtual Reality provides new forms of visualization for learners and an alternate form of information presentation for educators, allowing for close-up examination and manipulation of objects and concepts. Lastly, VR allows the learner to proceed at a controlled pace of their choosing.
Advantages
Extensive research has been (and still is) conducted into the use of Virtual Reality in education, and several advantages have been determined:
- VR captures the attention of students - and grabs a hold of it! Studies have reported them finding excitement and challenge in navigating three-dimensional environments and interacting with them.
- VR can simulate relevant scenarios to the topic at hand, such as high-pressure situations to test the learners' ability to respond under stress (e.g. a flight simulator can create extreme weather conditions to test trainees’ ability to navigate through them)
- VR can accurately illustrate features and processes - at times, more so than other means. For example, it can create a model of a molecule that students could expand substantially and inspect closely, and even navigate inside of.
- Virtual Reality gives learners the opportunity to navigate a topic at their own pace. For example, a student could take their time conducting a chemistry experiment without having to worry about their experiment going awry from them taking too long to get to the next step. This is especially beneficial for special needs student who benefit the most from alternative learning methods.
In high-risk specialties, such as surgery or heavy equipment training, where a mistake could carry devastating consequences, VR makes practice safe from catastrophic damage to the learner and anyone else involved.
Disadvantages
There are few disadvantages to using Virtual Reality:
- Time and money - VR is relatively expensive, and takes time to learn how to use the material.
- Groups - Handling medium to large groups, all wearing VR goggles, can be a challenge
- Motion sickness - VR can trigger motion sickness and photosensitive issues in susceptible individuals, and the headgear can cause discomfort when worn too extensively.
- Isolation - There are also concerns about the social impact being in virtual worlds for long periods of time can have on students - especially younger ones.
As the technology evolves, we will hopefully see more solutions addressing these issues!
As a final point, it is worth noting that the research has not been definitive on how best to integrate VR into learning programs. As such, experts currently advise against using VR as a simple substitute for human teachers, or when the interactions in the virtual world cannot replace those with real humans or objects.
Conclusion
Virtual Reality has earned its place in education and training. Extensive research confirms its added value.
As its adoption in education continues to grow and expand around the world, we will hopefully reach a common understanding of how it is best used. For the time being, though, experts concur that its best use is up to the educator’s discretion, and to always remember that while VR does have its advantages, no technology can simply replace real teachers.
