An exploration of the use of AI-embedded Augmented Reality Glasses on primary student learning experiences

AARE 2024 Blog 2

This blog was written live from AARE 2024, using my phone to take photos and record what was spoken about as it happening live. It’s a good showcase of a great presentation with an interesting topic!

This blog is by Steven Kolber, University of Melbourne

Presenters: Gretchen Geng, Flinders University; Amanda Telford, Australian Catholic University; Kathy Green, Australian Catholic University; Yue Zhu, Zhejiang Normal University; Ningqing Liang, Hangzhou Lingban Technology Co., Ltd (ROKID); Zhou Yueliang, Zhejiang Normal University

Gretchen presented on a large collaborative research study which will continue to develop over the coming years. Flinders University, ACU and Rokid are collaborating to make this an ongoing reality.

The distinction between AR: Augmented Reality, where additional information is overlaid onto a view of the real world.

VR: Virtual Reality is where a person is consumed by the focus of a virtual reality, and they are disconnected from the ‘real world’.

VR is not ideal for young students, because that cannot clearly differentiate between the real and the virtual worlds at such a young age. AR however can be used as a learning tool as students are still engaged with their lived reality.

Students might be bored by, say dinosaur fossils in a museum, but through AR goggles they might actually begin to see what these dinosaurs looked like when they were alive. And make the space of a museum more engaging through this new emerging technology. AI allows for communication with the goggles themselves as a possibility for further learning avenues.

Using seven primary school teachers from two schools, researchers and teachers co-designed lesson plans to suit their student cohorts. Students are able to interact with the virtual world through different types of ‘embodiment’, such as grabbing and grasping virtual objects. The question being explored is whether these embodiments are different to those accessible via say an iPad or laptop.

Teachers and students were learning alongside one another, and the goggles can be linked to a TV at the front of the class so that the remainder of the class can follow along with.

Another project looked at ‘smart dinosaurs’ where 100, year 1 and 2 primary students completed drawings before and after an AR learning experience. For example, the vast majority of students will draw a T-Rex as though they are the only example possible of a dinosaur. They learnt about the size of dinosaurs in comparison to themselves and of the diversity of these dinosaurs as a small example.

As you can already picture, this makes the classroom quite a different space, where students are engaged and excited about the interactive elements of this type of learning.

Originally posted:

#AARE2024 now! Hello and welcome to the third day of our AARE conference blog - EduResearch Matters

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