Hands-On Learning Through Immersive Experiences

[Video Transcript Begins]

People learn through experience. Until recent history, our experiences were limited by space, time, and resources. But now, thanks to the rapid development of extended reality technologies, i.e. VR, AR, and MR, these borders and limitations are no more. We can virtually send students to the moon for exploration or teach them how to weld an underwater pipeline with zero danger.

Extended reality has been on the public radar for quite some time (remember Virtual Boy?), however, only now are multiple industries beginning to pay close attention and invest. The technology has finally reached a point of consumer affordability where the average person, or business, can access the technology. As this technology becomes more mainstream, it is being adopted by numerous industries, such as healthcare, athletics, design, and many others.

Of all the industries that could be positively impacted by extended reality, education seems like it has the most to gain. Education has made great strides with the mainstream adoption of online learning in recent years; now it is time to take the next step.

This open educational resource (OER) looks specifically at the idea of hands-on learning (or experiential learning) facilitated through extended reality. A key concept we seek to investigate is whether the theory of experiential learning translates to immersive experiences, or if its advantages are only possible through direct, real-world experiences. We will look at such learning experiences in three sectors, including k-12, higher education, and the workplace/corporate. This will provide an opportunity to assess the value of experiential learning through immersive experiences in a wide variety of learning contexts.

[Video Transcript Ends]

Resource Structure

We have built out this (Google) site to walk you through our OER. The navigation menu at the top will allow you to move between the topic pages:

• Home - Introduction to the OER.

• Immersive Experiences - Overview of the various immersive experience/extended reality technologies.

• Hands-On Learning - Explanation of hands-on learning/experiential learning and why this is a valuable learning strategy.

• Applications - Breakdown of extended reality applications in three sectors of education.

• Opportunity Forecast - A look at the future market potential and financial factors.

• Try It! - A few interactive examples of XR (without the gear).

• Discussion Prompt Summary - A recap of all the discussion prompts throughout the OER, plus a bonus one to help answer our underlying question.

• References and Links - Opportunities for further reading.

You can also use the navigation buttons at the bottom of each page to move to the next one.

There will be discussion prompts throughout these pages to help garner dialogue on the topic. We will hold the discussion on the ETEC522 blog on our launchpad post. Click the red Discussion Prompt buttons to go directly to the forum. Please include the prompt you are responding to in bold as the opening line of your response. If you are responding to another post that already contains the prompt, there is no need to add it again. We will try to keep the threads organized by prompt as much as possible.

There are also live polling opportunities built into most pages via Google Forms. The charts to the right of the forms will update with live data as long as you refresh the page after submitting your response. These polls are designed to help all of us gain a better understanding of our group understanding and feelings on the topic of immersive experiences.