Virtual reality has not only changed the way we experience video games but our entire digital experience. The field of virtual reality has made a massive technological revolution in the digital space since 2012. With Covid-19 severely altering the education norms, what role does virtual reality play in education?
Virtual reality has travelled a long way from an idea on paper to a tool being used in the classrooms. Virtual reality can be a feasible option for schools and other similar learning centres by allowing educators and learners to approach education like never before. The use of virtual reality for learning can increase massively over the next five years.
The Difference in The Traditional and The VR Education
The learning system has not evolved much throughout history. The traditional approach to education is Fact Retention. The typical classroom experience includes sitting in lectures, visualizing facts in the textbook, and taking tests.
The learner lacks practical knowledge and does not get engaged much in the learning experience. The whole idea of traditional learning revolves around retaining facts and then present them in some shape or form somewhere in the future. With changing world and increasing competition, education must be engaging.
Virtual reality can make the learning experience more immersive and engaging. VR will not only make the learners see but also interact with the virtual world. A student can mix two or more chemicals and see the reaction without getting any physical harm.
Virtual reality can make learning enjoyable by making one experience space, science, history, and other fields, while being in the classroom. Not only this, but virtual reality has also altered the role of a teacher. With VR, the teacher not just delivers content but facilitates learning. VR has made educators create conditions for immersive learning rather than offering ready-made knowledge.
How Virtual Reality Benefits The Education System?
Virtual reality offers a vast range of applications to educators and the learners, such as:
Engaging Lesson Prep
Teaching is not that simple and facile as it seems to be. Teachers put a lot of real-world learning to put their skills to practice. Typically, the teachers are put into the classroom settings after they get the required certifications. With VR, this practice has changed.
Virtual reality offers teachers to educate themselves before stepping into the classroom. VR gives teachers ways to hone their teaching skills through systems such as TeachLive. The teachers can practice lessons in mixed-reality settings with student avatars responding to them.
This practice also facilitates teachers to gauge their learning to the learners and practice complex tasks. Virtual reality also offers teachers to deal with difficult classroom situations before they occur in real.
Digital Classroom Sessions
Virtual reality facilitates teaching by recording and recreating actual classroom sessions. The 360-degree cameras help to create detailed emerging lessons. Students can use these recorded sessions if they miss any class and learn as if they were there. The technique is beneficial to the teachers as well, and the teachers can gain insights about their teaching styles and improve accordingly.
Enhanced Learning Opportunities
Virtual reality has enhanced the learning opportunities to the next level. Virtual reality has eliminated the barriers of cost and accessibility and provided never-ending opportunities. The experiences that were once limited to excursions can be experienced within the classroom with virtual reality.
From visiting Mars to swimming underwater with fish to field trips to laboratory experiences, VR has made it possible to encounter these in a room. The VR has massively reduced the cost and opened gates for more accessibility. Virtual reality enhances the learning opportunities in the following ways:
1. Emotional Connect: VR offers memorable experiences for the students that increases the power of retention.
2. Creativity: Virtual reality open gates for the students to showcase their creativity virtually and then make the best out of it in the real world.
3. Visual Learning: VR offers visual learning that increases the comprehension of educational content.
Virtual reality can bring a massive revolution in the field of education. The cost reduction has made it possible for the low-income communities to learn things without any bar. As it is said, it is easier to retain the facts by direct experience rather than learning. Virtual reality can be a formidable classroom.
However, VR should only supplement classroom learning, not replace it. VR can shake up the regular classroom learning experience and make learning engaging by taking one step away from the mundane stuff.
