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- Welcome to Part 1 of Immersive pedagogy:
Virtual reality for student-centered learning.
Virtual reality -or VR- has enormous potential
to make learning more engaging
and to meet the needs of diverse learners.
But, not all VR is created equal.
And immersive experiences that simulate real life
and provide new and engaging learning opportunities
also require an immersive learning pedagogy.
So, how can schools make the most of VR
by using its full potential
to ensure every student is succeeding?
Today, we'll see an example of taking VR
from vision to reality.
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- When we started this program,
we realised that we didn't really
have the expertise to actually take on
the virtual reality project.
So we actually reached out to industry.
And we were very fortunate that we were able
to work with Adrian Rayner, who worked in industry
in virtual reality.
And we were able to bring him on board with the project
and he was able to work with Dr. Susan O'Donnell,
who's one of our curriculum leaders in this,
and work with her very carefully
on how we actually implement virtual reality
into the Australian Curriculum and how we bring
the learning experiences to life for students.
Well, the beauty of working across the three schools,
that's Woree State High School, Bentley Park College,
and Gordonvale State High, is that we've been
able to tap into the talents of all the teachers
in the -especially in junior secondary-
across the three schools.
We do meet regularly.
We've looked at how we can work more closely together.
We're all in one in one core area down here
on the southern side of Cairns.
And we're all working with similar type kids
and we've got similar type issues around disengagement.
And we identified that as a problem of practise.
And we've been able to use that, what we've learned,
across the three schools.
So what we do, what we develop,
in Gordonvale State High School for instance,
we've just done a big unit of work down there
on Ancient Rome.
All that work can then be used
at Bentley Park College and Woree State High School,
and that works across all three schools.
So, I think the -- I think the best part of it
is that we've been able to tap into
the talents of the individual teachers,
and each school has got a different strength.
And with that, they've been able to bring that to the table.
And that's what's been the beauty of the work
that we've done across the three schools.
- Virtual reality in education
requires two elements working together
to be successful: the technology and the pedagogy.
A common misconception is that all VR is created equal.
While mobile and cardboard solutions have their place,
what we're trying to do is create a learning solution
that goes far beyond just engagement.
All curriculum-aligned software is developed
within the Department of Education by educators.
Keeping it in-house ensures that development
and iteration time is reduced, and ensures our content
is relevant for teachers.
Safety is structured in two parts.
The virtual part, where every module we release
has a safety boundary built in that highlights
visually and with audio when the student has left
the safe working zone.
In the real world, this is matched by
the yellow safety learning space.
This is a benefit for students collecting data
and observing, so they don't get in the way of the user.
We also have 'My Behaviour in Virtual Reality Values'
on the walls in all of our VR rooms.
This is a set of rules to keep our students safe
and designed to make them into great virtual citizens.
'Easy to use' is teachers not having to charge equipment,
find locations, set up boundaries,
or use complex log-in or startup systems to get started.
By design, we have limited the VR controls
to the same functions or mechanics in all of our modules.
For example, every icon that is yellow,
students can interact with.
This approach is so students do not spend
all their time learning VR,
but instead learning the subject.
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- The creation of VR modules
fully aligned with the Australian Curriculum.
That's what we're about. That's our core purpose.
Immersive pedagogy is really about
a partnership between technology, pedagogy and curriculum.
We use the curriculum documents almost as our design manual
when writing materials, and this ensures that students
are fully immersed in all of the key content
and the skills for that unit in that subject
for that year level.
In this sense, the pedagogy reflects
that VR and a VR session
is a real pivot point of time,
which immerses students in learning across the whole unit.
The inquiry-based problem solving approach
to teaching and learning suits best for the use of VR,
and this is constantly reflected
in our student worksheets and resources.
Intentional collaboration is built into what we do,
so that students can help each other
and support each other in their shared learning.
And this is a big plus, from what students tell us.
When teachers are introduced to VR
for the very first term, for them it can often
be an amazing considerable shift
from the way that they normally would teach.
However, we want to work with them
to make sure that this doesn't become a barrier.
We set them up for success by providing them with
professional development.
We show them, for example, how the pedagogy
of the VR session can change,
depending on when the session is scheduled.
Another barrier can be teacher anxiety
that using VR will result in an upswing in their workload.
Again, we take this anxiety on board
and all of our modules are ready-for-use,
plug-and-play designed packages
with everything a teacher would need.
We're constantly working to improve what we're doing
for teaching and learning.
All of this work is to help students find
new and exciting ways to learn and achieve.
And for teachers to see that they can use technology
in ways that they couldn't have imagined.
- There is a significant investment in time
to develop (an) immersive pedagogy unit.
And there's lots of opportunities to bring in VR,
but we only develop units that can be used
by more than one school.
I currently have three Japanese language teachers
working alongside Adrian collaboratively
to build the new Japanese unit.
As a HOD, I really value that deep curriculum knowledge
that my team bring to co-developing units of work.
Being able to immerse students in the learning
provides the buy-in for teachers
to contribute to the design.
So for language teachers, imagine being able
to take your students on a trip to Japan,
and then building on that experience
to create teachable moments.
I like to lead by example.
I love using immersive pedagogy.
And when my staff see that I am committed
to making time to help build their capability,
they know I value them and their professional journey.
- Hi, Adrian.
- Hi, Monte. Welcome to the virtual reality hub.
- Oh, it looks fantastic.
How would a school go about setting up something like this?
- Well, there's a number of ways to set up these,
but we're using Microsoft: Mixed Reality solution.
Would you like to have a go?
- Love to!
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Today we've seen the value of drawing on industry expertise
and collaboration across schools.
We've also seen how to set up a VR hub,
from vision to implementation,
with curriculum alignment at the centre.
In the next episode, we'll see the VR hub in action,
learn about the curriculum design process,
and hear from teachers and students
about the outcomes of immersive pedagogy.
(inspirational upbeat music)