STEM applications for virtual reality

1. STEM and Immersive Virtual Reality:
Serious Games, Serious Teaching . . .
and Learning
Forthcoming Paper: Conceptual Framework & Practical Design for
Learning in Immersive Virtual Reality
Eileen A. O’Connor, Ph.D.
Empire State College – eileen.oconnor@esc.edu

2. Agenda
• Audience poll
• Visual chronology of my experiences
• Change in the field – open source, price change, available islands
• Online “serious” uses
• Conceptual framework for planning and design
• Fast ways to get started

3. Poll of audience
• What would you like to have in a virtual space?
• How many of you have online as all or part of your work?
• What sense of community do YOUR STUDENTS have – you interact with them
all, but how many interact with each other?
• Do you have a space where online students can meet & get to know
& share with each other

4. Pathway through virtual – starting with Second
Life – considered how to bring in other faculty
• First given the option to “experiment” – with some help on building and the
like; space was made available by ESC
• By 2007, brought science education students into this environment, initially
for meetings among colleagues, with the dean, with other teachers
• Then had the student present their work in a science project; committees
created and met too to discuss education concerns; classes meet on other
islands
• Published: O’Connor, E. A. and Sakshaug, L. (2009) Preparing for Second Life: Two Teacher Educators Reflect on Their Initial Foray into Virtual
Teaching and Learning, Journal of Educational Technology Systems, 37(3), pp. 259-272.
• O'Connor, E. (2008). Becoming a Virtual Instructor: How Can Higher Education Faculty Prepare for Second Life?. In G. Richards (Ed.), Proceedings
of World Conference on E-Learning in Corporate, Government, Healthcare, and Higher Education 2008 (pp. 1144-1149). Chesapeake, VA: AACE.
• O'Connor, E. A. (2008). Initial Study of Pre-Service Teachers' Comments on a Reality-Based, Urban-Student Video Streamed within an Online
Course. Journal of Educational Technology Systems, 37(2), 139-157. Retrieved from EBSCOhost.

5. Moved beyond Second Life – cost /
exportability, prebuilt materials, privacy
• Expanded to a program where students had the elective graduate school
concentration (and courses, through OpenSUNY) with the option of creating
their own virtual worlds
• Making custom islands now to house science resources and material

6. My experiences Collaboration
space
Poster
session
STEP
program
Speakers /
presentation
Joint video
viewing
But don’t assume your idea
will be “theirs” – create
meaning in your own space;
often they think video game

13. Later courses, students created their own
island – more than STEM areas here
http://www.slideshare.net/eoconnor/suny-cit-2015-immersive-virtual-environments-open-source

20. I created a STEM/healthcare environment too
• Ie. Sub-Saharan
African
healthcare -
https://sites.goo
gle.com/site/ser
vehealthcarestu
dy/
• http://eileenoco
nnor1.wix.com/s
erve-healthcare

21. Actual night for the posters
• We moved around
together
• An example session -
https://www.youtube.com
/watch?v=4GvYDuiwvdE&f
eature=youtu.be

22. Meeting for debriefings – enjoy the informality –
without travel or equipment setup

23. Have a poster session • For synchronous sharing in comfort
• For later independent visiting

24. Other uses – resource area / interactive web
links Have your own classroom area – this is
always set up and open for students to
visit or collaborate in, even when you
aren’t there

25. Multipurpose areas
• Many
classroom
purposes
• Save on your
own computer
w/ an Export
function

26. Fun places too
• Islands for low cost - $15 - $20
per month / export & save
when finished
• Resources available for free

27. Drivers for virtual growth: Increased
availability & usability
• Affordable / share-able / save-able
• Multiple islands & uses
• Need in higher education for community with online courses
• The field is improving the interface
• Oculus – Facebook

28. Conceptual
Framework –
ways to help YOU
organize & plan
virtual efforts
Community / Context
• Presence & collaboration
• Simulates reality & known
mental schema
Integrating /
Scheduling
• Extension of course
• Threading into course
Assessment /
Evaluation
• Similar to classroom or
computer based
The “experience”/
motivation
• From predesigned curriculum
to building / creating
• Immersive buy-in
• What makes this serious?
Place /
location

29. Online courses & community building
• “One clear take-away from this study is that it is incumbent upon
faculty to play a leadership role in building community in their virtual
classrooms. . . . However, with a compounded annual growth rate
forecast in distance education of 33% (Oblinger & Kidwell, 2000), it is
a challenge we cannot afford to ignore.”
• Vesely, P., Bloom, L., Sherlock, J.
http://jolt.merlot.org/vol3no3/vesely.htm
This article discusses the importance of building community within an online environment and it looks at the
differences between the way the students and the faculty consider online courses to be best served. The
students really like the faculty modeling their participation — in this case the referring to faculty joining in
and discussion boards. The online environment allows for faculty to model the work by their very visual
participation

30. Virtual Reality – and distance learning, in general
Miller R. The Application of Virtual Reality in Higher Education Distance Learning. Journal Of Applied Learning
Technology [serial online]. Fall2014 2014;4(4):15-18. Available from: Education Source, Ipswich, MA. Accessed
February 5, 2016.
“Though the technology is not fully developed nor readily available, the application of
virtual reality in distance education proves to be promising. There are already a
significant amount of benefits being achieved through the use of virtual worlds such
as Second Life. These benefits will only be enhanced through deeper immersion in a
virtual reality environment. Teaching in a VR environment is promising to be highly
effectively and though the primary goal is to provide an effective learning
environment for distance education students, it has the potential to surpass the
benefits of a traditional classroom. Providing a state-of-the-art learning experience for
students will not only benefit the colleges and universities in their competitive
environment, but also aid in preparing students for their entry into the workforce.”

31. Serious game – definitions:
“Serious gaming can be defined as the use of game principles for the purposes
of learning, skill acquisition, and training. It should not be confused with
“edutainment,” which by definition is lacking in interactivity and is based on a
“skill and drill” format . . . Good game play is hard work. The learner should
be performing at the maximum of his or her skill level and may be exerting
significant cognitive effort. This is analogous to “practicing at the top of your
license.” Somewhat surprisingly, winning is not an essential element of many
of the best games, in which the learner is constantly pushed to higher and
higher levels of achievement without the possibility of actually “winning.”
Cain, J., & Piascik, P. (2015). Are Serious Games a Good Strategy for Pharmacy
Education?. American Journal Of Pharmaceutical Education, 79(4), 1-6.

32. Serious work, by O'Connor
• Modified definition of serious gaming for education purposes and
particularly for higher education purposes
• K-12 environments are more exacting - expectations for technology and
games and they are harder to control these environments
• be cautious when thinking your idea of learning will be theirs
• In higher education, serious games can come from the application of
constructivist and community-of-practices thinking:
• Role-playing
• Project-based learning / collaborations
• Community and context of the academic environment
• Developing objects and environments – advanced application

33. STEM serious games – in one meeting / over
time; model a science enterprise
• Role playing – as scientists
• Discussions
• Presentations – critical peer review
• Actual scientist visits – bring in background elements too / images,
links, PPT
• A 2.5 minute video on an integrated healthcare application -
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xOtW4cAAlTE
• A 17 minute TED talk on flying through virtual reality -
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pGiqq12mdUs

34. Learner / visitor considerations: Understanding
audience – but don’t limit to your own preferences
• Audience & their intent / understanding
• Do they want a “real game”? - consider their background
• My work with middle school
• Will they have serious intent?
• What coaching / background do they need?
• Can they be paired for skills?
• learning from the game environments and creating platforms, experience, and
expectations that are more adapted to the rules and expectations within higher
education and K-12 education — bringing in the serious environment through the
problems developed; not just edutainment ($$$)
• The broadening in the world today

35. Leverage existing mental models – participants
already have the schema developed
• Images of different apps - Post boards;
decorated classroom; seats and
lounges; amusement park areas;
indicate that these already set the
tones
• Use the education learning
environments that are already
established
• Interesting, notice the protocols
already known by students— such as
seating in particular areas

36. Design for interactions – it has to be part of
something for it to be useful
• Having a space will not be enough
— If you build they won't
necessarily JUST come
• Integrate into a course
• Use as a place for course meetings
• Have ongoing materials and supports
in the location
• Integrate the f2f or online course
with the virtual space
• Use Snapshots for attendance

37. Assessment
&
evaluation
• Is it meeting the
learning
objectives? How
do you know?
• Is the
environment
serving the
activities well?
With participants present Can be conducted later
Observations /
videotaping
/Snapshots
Document as many interactions
as possible
Participants can take and share
snapshots
Building activities Can be observed building Artifacts left for later review
Interactions and text
chats
Interactions can be viewed;
texts chats stored for
examination later
Text files can be saved and
examined later
Presentations /role
playing
Reports, presentations,
interactions with artifacts,
scenarios and role play
Participants could videotaped
themselves & submit these later
External quizzing Participants take quizzes after
they have left the virtual
environment
External reports Participants make report’s –
snapshots could be included
Surveys In-world survey tools are
available
Surveys could be taken after
participants leave the
environment
Avatar trackers Trackers document time when
avatars enter a space (see
operations document)
Data from trackers can be
analyzed to determine points
visited and persistence at these
points

38. Reasons for usage – commitment to
education
• Simulates a real meeting in class —Already developed a mental
schema
• Ownership and responsibility
• Apologies to the class – on being late or missing work
• Shared problem solving
• Wanting to see what the others looked like over time
• Something to tell their children and friends
• Dede study w/ AR and commitment / commitment / collaboration

39. Plan a growth & testing path – small steps in
the first course
Predesigned or
borrowed
Meetings /
presentation
• Students teach
students
Role playing / as
professionals or in
the profession
Looping back to
the course

40. Attending to the learners & to getting the
acclimated
Startup
Ice breakers
Grouping strategies
• Acquiring viewer
• Basic skills
• Prep – solo
• Team scavenger hunts
• Solo scavenger hunts
• Empower all types
• Match gamer / non gamer

41. An approach
to getting
started –
don’t go for
perfection
Find: predesigned /
shared / Second Life
Pilot
• meaningful activity
• meetings
Network
• Community w/ other
teachers

42. Different types of “school”
environments – self made
from artifacts
– informal

43. Or use the predesigned universal campus –
with labs, lecture halls, and outdoor areas too
https://youtu.be/CPvqX2rmvdE

44. Support of faculty need, or is it?
• Younger faculty may be more comfortable / share among faculty
• Gregory S, Scutter S, Jacka L, McDonald M, Farley H, Newman C.
Barriers and Enablers to the Use of Virtual Worlds in Higher
Education: An Exploration of Educator Perceptions, Attitudes and
Experiences. Journal Of Educational Technology & Society [serial
online]. January 2015;18(1):3-12. Available from: Academic Search
Complete, Ipswich, MA. Accessed February 5, 2016

45. Securing a
VR space
Create /
acquire
Second Life
Open Sim
Visit
SUNY
Other
island
Borrow
Eileen.oconnor@esc.edu

46. Requirements & Concerns – support for
sustainability
Sustainability plan / support for faculty
◦Consider an analogy to physical space
◦Reuse & multi-purpose
◦Documentation & support hub
◦Provide tech support
Gregory S, Scutter S, Jacka L, McDonald M, Farley H, Newman C. Barriers and Enablers to the Use of Virtual
Worlds in Higher Education: An Exploration of Educator Perceptions, Attitudes and Experiences. Journal Of
Educational Technology & Society [serial online]. January 2015;18(1):3-12. Available from: Academic Search
Complete, Ipswich, MA. Accessed February 5, 2015

47. The dilemma of too much freedom
Complexity of the world since it can embrace all the interactions of content, materials, players,
interactions, curriculum, assessment and learner
Just as in the classroom you are not fully aware of all these components and backgrounds, you
don’t have that here either
Focus within and understand that there are things you aren’t able to do presently but that might
be easy to start now

48. Requirements & Concerns – ownership /
legal
Expanding issues for educators
Legal and ownership issues
Fairfield (2012) –
◦ pervasive computing, emerging areas of law,
◦ who owns what transpires in these environments?