Active learning and collaboration creates the best outcomes

“The technology is no longer the primary constraint for what we want to develop in this field. The answer to what will happen in 2019 is dependent on our careful positioning within a learning paradigm and clarity about the intended learning outcome for students’ activities. Well-designed VR/AR apps allow us to activate students and most importantly not only to activate students to work on their own. The very best apps allow students to collaborate and even co-create simultaneously in the virtual learning space. Thus, we are aiming at effective and activating learning situations together with high levels of learning outcomes and deep thinking. When we produce application at the University of Southern Denmark we are aiming at taxonomy levels where our students are “applying”, “evaluating” and “creating” rather than just “remembering”. Close interaction between the programmers and the teachers is inevitable during development of such applications. During the last two months we have put a lot of resources into developing virtual applications in AR where students in the same AR-room can work in groups, discuss content and interact together directly on the content. Thus, stimulating activity, collaboration and co-creation. Such collaborative facility also helps instructors to enter the virtual room to guide students directly. This is certainly a way to go for 2019. Since development is a costly affair, another of our primary aims is developing flexible content. Feeding learning-objects - chosen by teachers - from larger databases into VR and using AI to visualise objects builds a flexibility into the apps. Likewise, development of a user-friendly interface through which teachers can feed both information and exercises into VR/AR without being tech-wizards is a key area for future interest.”