Polar Exploration with Sandbox AR
at Lawford Church of England Primary School
Lawford Church of England Primary School in Manningtree, Essex has invested in one to one Windows Laptops to support everyday teaching and learning. The school is now investing in iPad to explore the creative and immersive potential of the Sandbox AR platform in combination with developing teacher and pupil use of video and audio to further enhance learners' outcomes. The case study below was based use of two iPad loaned to the school for one morning in support of the Polar Exploration topic taught in Year 6.
How have you been using Sandbox AR to study Polar Exploration?
'Augmented reality helps me show and produce my learning because once I've seen it, I understand it a lot more than I probably would have if I had been taught it just by pen and paper and what someone has told me. Once you see it with your own eyes, you know what it's like. And you think, wow, that's what explorers have to do. And it's quite amazing, really.'
Year 6 Pupil - Lawford C of E Primary School
How can AR help make abstract concepts more concrete?
'I think immersive technology makes Polar Exploration less abstract because it shows how this job is really quite a difficult one and how if you're stuck in a crevasse, it can be quite, quite daunting to get out of. But if you're a trained professional, like in the video, the Explorer, he said, yeah, it's quite easy to get out of a crevasse, but to people who don't normally go in crevasses for a living, it can be really scary. '
Year 6 Pupil - Lawford C of E Primary School
What difference does sound make when creating AR?
'I think the sound made a big difference to the immersion because we used tonal music, and sound effects. It really builds my understanding of what you would see in the Antarctic and inside crevasses. The sound and the music sets the tone; it really made you feel like you were in that crevasse and you were actually stuck in it. And for a moment, I got a little bit scared.'
Year 6 Pupil - Lawford C of E Primary School
How did you recreate the wreck of the Endurance in Sandbox AR?
'In class, we've been learning about Ernest Shackleton's Endurance ship and the polar expedition. After we saw a BBC news clip, we decided we would recreate it on Sandbox AR and I think it resembles it quite a bit. It's not perfect, but I think it really looks quite good.'
Year 6 Pupil - Lawford C of E Primary School
