What is VR, AR and Google Cardboard?

What is VR?

VR

In simple terms, Virtual Reality (VR) is a complete, immersive experience that is separate to the physical world. For this, you would need VR devices such as HTV Vive, Oculus Rift or Google Cardboard.

This quick video from Google demonstates an example of how you could use VR in a lesson, granted it is for a younger audience but it’s just an idea to aid understanding.

What is AR?

AR

Augmented Reality (AR) simply adds a digital element to a live view, most often by using the camera on your phone. A good example of AR is the lenses in Snapchat or the Pokemon Go smartphone game. The video here shows an example of the AR of Google Expeditions.

This video from Google shows a couple of different examples of AR in the classroom, watching a volcano erupt or looking at an asteroid belt.

Google Cardboard

Whilst some VR devices are quite expensive, you’ll see that Google Cardboard is very low cost. The standard Google Cardboard device is currently £11.40 because you use the Google Expeditions or Google Cardboard apps on your smartphone and place your smartphone into the Cardboard device as a viewer. Whereas a device like an Oculus Rift, which has a screen and all the tech packaged inside the viewer, will set you back around £400 each.

If you picked a Google Cardboard viewer for around £5, you could kit out 3 classrooms with viewers for the price of a single Oculus Rift device.

These devices allow you to position your smartphone in the unit to work as the VR screen. This is perfect for a classroom environment, especially since almost everyone has a smartphone these days. This video we made shows just how quick and easy it is to add a smartphone to the viewer.

CoSpaces EDU

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CoSpaces EDU lets students build their own 3D creations, animate them with code and explore them in Virtual or Augmented Reality.


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Book Creator

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Book Creator is a simple tool for creating awesome digital books. Create your own teaching resources or have students take the reins.


Combine text, images, audio and video to create a range of different types of book, such as:

  • Interactive Stories
  • Digital Portfolios
  • Science Reports
  • Instruction Manuals

As a student, it doesn’t matter what level or subject you’re at, you can easily demonstrate your understanding by creating a book.

  • ‘About Me’ Books
  • Comic Adventures
  • Research Journals
  • Poetry Books

As a teacher, you can create reference books for your students, or even just simple info books about the course.

Chromebook App Hub

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Find ideas and activities on Google’s new Chromebook App Hub. Explore how educators across the globe are using Chromebooks in education. Each app recommendation gives you resources for getting started and examples of how it is being used in the classroom. Apps and ideas can be filtered by cateogry, age range, subject, and language.

There are so many ideas to explore, so to save you some time we’ve included some of our favourites:

EduFuturists Podcast

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The EduFuturists podcast network includes 4 podcasts: Edufuturists, Edufuturists Vault, Edufuturists Bitesize and In the Studio. A wide range of edtech topics are discussed covering various ways to use technology to enhance learning in the classroom. To listen to the EduFuturists podcasts on Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, or Spotify, visit https://www.edufuturists.com/

Vevox

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Vevox is a real-time polling and Q&A app. Simply put, you can build a quick quiz to check if the class have understood the lesson or at the start of the lesson see how much the class remember from last lesson.


Class Timetable

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Use Class Timetable to manage your schedule and organize your tasks. Get notifications for upcoming lessons and tasks you need to complete.


Brainscape

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Brainscape is a flashcard or ‘smart notecards’ app that has been built on the back of cognitive science to you DOULBE your learning speed.


JISC Student Digital Experience Insights Results [2018-2019]

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The JISC digital experience insights survey asks students across FE and HE about their experiences of digital in insitituions throughout the country. This year it was completed by nearly 38,000 students. You can view our results here.

Photomath

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Photomath helps you interpret problems and drive your learning and understanding of maths. Simply scan an equation with your smartphone camera and the app will solve it instantly then show you how to work it out for yourself in future.


It’s so simple to use Photomath, just open the app and use the camera on your phone to view the equation, you’ll get an instant solution. With handwriting recognition too, you can find the answer to even the toughest math problems within seconds. Each answer will also provide you with step-by-step instructions on how to solve the equation so you can learn at the same time!