Year 2 & Beyond

June 17, 2019

Opportunities to “travel” virtually have become more common at Scotts Ridge Middle School this year, with varying levels of immersion.

At a basic level, for example, social studies or world language students might open Google Earth on their chromebooks and select the “peg man” icon in order to drag and drop it into a 360° view of the Amazon Rainforest or the Eiffel Tower.

At a higher immersion level, science students who have been studying landforms might paddle through an underwater sea cave in 360° or fly over an active volcano using our classroom collection of discarded phones and virtual reality viewers.

At an even higher level of immersion and creativity, 6th grade social studies students have created 360° “tours” of a prominent location in an English- or Spanish-speaking country. Using Tour Creator, students added 3D images from Google Maps to their tour, as well as points of interest, narration and background sound. Students created QR codes so visitors to their “Globalization Marketplace” event could experience the tour in 360° using virtual reality viewers.

Augmented Reality (AR)

Students have also had the opportunity to experiment with augmented reality, which layers digital experiences over your existing space. For example, MERGE cubes allow users to utilize apps that can place a globe or a 3D village in the palm of your hand.

• A social studies world conflict unit culminates with an augmented reality video “popping out” from the image of student-designed and written books using HP Reveal.
• This year social studies students considered the effects of population on the environment using the DIG! app for MERGE cube as well as the QuiverVision app.
• Science students wrapped up a landforms unit using the HoloGLOBE app for MERGE cube in order to view plate boundaries, ocean and air currents while holding a 3D Earth in their hands. Using the QuiverVision app, students scanned a volcano sketch to launch a 3D volcano and make it erupt!

Read more about our experience diving into VR and AR in this Knowledge Quest article authored by Mrs. Johnson.

Bringing VR to Ridgefield Public Schools

The Ridgefield Public School district is supporting the effort to bring VR/AR experiences to all grade levels:

• East Ridge Middle School uses retired phones and a classroom set of MERGE VR viewers available through the Library Learning Commons.

Beginning in August, 2019:

• One classroom set of MERGE viewers and MERGE cubes will be available through the Library Learning Commons at Ridgefield High School
• A mobile classroom set of VR viewers and phones will be available for the elementary school libraries to share in collaboration with classroom teachers.

How can our students experience VR in every subject? See these examples from our two-year journey.

For more about VR and AR at Scotts Ridge, follow us @SRMSLLC or visit bit.ly/srms-llc.