How Augmented Reality Could Be A Blueprint For Virtual Classrooms In The Future
Technology is rapidly advancing and creeping in many aspects of our lives. If we are to keep up with its pace, we must incorporate it effectively in our classrooms. The future is now and our educators must act promptly to ensure that they are taking the right measures required to reshape the classrooms into a system that can keep up with the technology being used in our daily life.
Massive Shift of Preschool Education; Augmented Reality in Education
One must acknowledge that unlike conventional methods of teaching, nowadays children as young as one to two years are being pacified or taught through interactive surfaces. Parents find it more convenient to have their child sit into front of a screen and watch their favorite character sing a song for hours on repeat; instead of cradling them endlessly and singing in their not so melodious voice.
This shift is making children not only more receptive to the change, but it is also making them anticipate it more. Quite naturally, a child who has been exposed to teaching methods involving a screen and creative characters would find books with two dimensional drawings rather boring. Hence, if as educators, we are adamant upon keeping up their levels of interest then we must take drastic and practical measures to bring technology into the classroom as well.
How Augmented Reality Comes into Play?
For one to understand how Augmented Reality can be used, they must fully be aware of what exactly Augmented Reality is. One is not far from the practical use of augmented reality in this day and age, we have already successfully incorporated it in other fields. For example, weather channels use augmented reality to help us understand the severity of an imminent cyclone or tornado. Even the widely popular game called Pokemon Go used Augmented Reality; where players were required to use their environment as an in-game playground and actually step out of their house to find Pokemons – all of this was done through geotracking and Augmented Reality.
Hence, this must have drawn a clear picture of what exactly Augmented Reality is and how it functions. Assignment help UK has explained augmented reality as taking technology and using real backgrounds and environments to go hand in hand with it.
This can be done mostly through digital overlays either through a screen or through head mounted headsets. Either way, it requires a mode through which one can see all of these added features in their real life environment.
The question of how it can really come into play within our classrooms is yet to be fully explored. Since there haven’t been any solid additions pertaining to technological incorporation through augmented reality in classrooms, it is rather early to predict what the outcomes must be, but the possibilities are endless.
Nonetheless, there has been a massive growth of apps that have been successfully using augmented reality to teach kids key concepts.
Some apps that have reached milestones in incorporating augmented reality with education include the following;
Elements 4D
This app comes with a set of blocks that represent common elements from the periodic table. Once you view these blocks through the app downloaded in your device, you will be able to watch them change color and provide all details of the said element. More interestingly, once you bring two of these blocks together, the app will also explain how they shall react. It is certainly an interesting manner of helping children learn through easy visualization in a fun and engaging manner.
Anatomy 4D
It helps them explore exactly where each muscle originates from and inserts in. Moreover, all the minute, entwined courses of the blood vessels are also shown within the intricate parts of the human body. This is a huge leap forward from the conventional method of studying human anatomy through 2D atlases or cutting up cadavers to better understand the anatomy.
Animal Alphabet AR Flashcards
With a set of specialized Flashcards, children can point their device’s camera towards the cards and watch the animals pop up on screen. The app is designed for younger children who are just beginning to explore the animal kingdom. But it proves to be a fun and interactive manner of keeping them hooked and actually encourage learning.
Bridging the Gap between Single Devices and an Entire Classroom
Most of these apps and the newer advancements in augmented reality work through individual modes that include a single person to work through pointing their devices at a certain object and watch it come to life. This cannot be readily applied to classrooms since it would create quite a racket with children bringing their own device and studying different things. Instead if one truly wishes to see Augmented Reality work in full swing within classrooms, one must find a more uniform mode. This could be through a single big screened device that everyone could simultaneously use. Or a group activity where students can be divided and given concentrated supervision so that they can actually learn together. Some suggestions have included reviewing books, using word walls or simply scanning homework for a quick look into one’s mistakes.
Why Incorporating Augmented Reality Has Become a Pressing Need?
Augmented reality must be quickly included in the classrooms because of the general shift of interest in students from the conventional methods of studying to a more interactive manner of learning things. Moreover, once the students begin to gain interest in learning things through screens, learning through reading and comprehending deep texts can become a rather arduous task. One must either keep the two hand in hand, or the pressing need of translating all this text into an augmented reality interface should be addressed. The latter seems to be rather far-fetched right now. Hence, it is only advisable to encourage young learners to keep up their daily reading habits as well.
