Day 13: Using Augmented Reality in classrooms for teachers

AR in Education?

New technologies enable new opportunities for education. From the decades of research, we can see how computer technology in the classroom can improve the learning experience. Augmented reality (AR), enables the connection of the digital world and the physical world. It is one of the newest tech being used and applied in education.

We all have seen many Augmented Reality games and apps like Pokémon Go, Snapchat. But the reach and applications of AR don’t end there. When applied properly, Augmented reality can be immensely successful in Education as well.

In this article,  we will take a look at how AR can be applied in education and see what advantages it offers.

Setting up AR for Classrooms

Teachers are constantly looking to keep the student’s attention during the classes and since outside of the school, there are all types of visual cues and media. Gamifying something like learning and classes keeps the children engaged throughout the class. For example, our Educators AR Learning platform Class XR, is an Augmented Reality Learning platform that runs on iOS devices like iPads. It offers teacher-created Augmented experiences that embed 360 Photos, Videos, and 3D models. Students can then login with the class code and explore this 3D content in AR.

The content is accessible via an AR Portal, which gamifies the experience to keep the students engaged.

Unity being a game engine provides all the tools you would need to create such AR Experiences. You can find more technical posts on how to get started with AR with our projects here.

Learning by doing through AR

When students experience  AR across various domains and lessons, their understanding reaches the next level as these types of hands-on learning can result in a very high retention rate of information.

Geography and History Sciences

Through AR, history can be re-enacted through carefully designed scenes placed in AR, for example, battles and important events. With Geography, the different landscapes can be augmented into the real world providing next-level visual access to the matter from the textbooks. Different places can be visited and explored.

Unity being a 3D Game Engine, Building 3D geometry and manipulation tools are intuitive. It offers all the tools you’ll need to customize the experience. It being multi-platform you will have apps running on multiple devices in no time without having to port it.

Physics and Chemistry

Real-time physics simulations and experiments can be performed without the use of actual physical equipment. Same goes for chemistry, one could visualize atoms and the chemical bonds in AR by looking at them directly. 

Another area where AR can be a valuable addition is building experiences like the Moon landing, Black holes, Space exploration in classrooms. Astronomy is a big domain which makes a strong case for AR. Just imagine opening up a merging black holes experience and watching what happens first hand. We have just the lesson made with ClassXR.

What makes Unity, a great tool for this is its Physx physics rendering engine. It offers accurate and great API’s to create such simulations from fluid mechanics, collisions to rigidbody mechanics. In fact, I earlier built a whole app on Unity which simulated Newton’s three laws of motion.

AR with Spatial Content

AR with learning is more effective when the topics have a strong spatial component. For example, let’s take an example of electromagnetism. The outcome of the lesson would be significantly higher when animated animations of the magnetic lines of force are visualized in a 3D model in an AR space. The AR interface adds interactivity and visual representation enhancing the subject learning.