George Mason University's multidisciplinary collaboration brings VR STEM experience for elementary students - India Education Diary

Faculty, staff, and students from 3 units crossed George Mason University person worked unneurotic to make a caller virtual world (VR) acquisition for simple students. Through an immersive nine-minute video, students tin instrumentality a “field trip” to the Mason apiary, learning from an adept beekeeper, taking a heavy dive into a hive, and adjacent flying similar foraging chromatic bees.

Funded by the Sweet Virginia Foundation, a Northern Virginia-based biology acquisition nonprofit, this caller learning instrumentality is simply a collaborative task with the School of Business, which houses the Honey Bee Initiative (HBI), the College of Education and Human Development (CEHD), and the College of Engineering and Computing (CEC). The “field trip” is designed to heighten existing pollinator curricula taught successful Virginia fourth-grade classrooms, and foster involvement successful science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) and STEM careers successful today’s youth.

The thought for the virtual tract travel began astir a decennary agone with Daniel Price, laminitis of the Sweet Virginia Foundation, and Mason prof Lisa Gring-Pemble, HBI co-founder. Enter Mason researcher Carley Fisher-Maltese, an adjunct prof successful the CEHD, who helped marque that imagination a reality.

The 360-degree video features Sarah Red-Laird, laminitis and manager of The Bee Girl Organization, which is wide known for teaching kids, beekeepers, and farmers however to “love their bees,” and students from Willow Springs Elementary School successful Fairfax, Virginia. The video was created by CreatorUp!, a California-based video accumulation company.

“This virtual tract travel engages simple schoolhouse children successful learning astir the plight of chromatic bees, and their narration to nutrient security,” said Gring-Pemble, who is besides the co-executive manager of the Business for a Better World Center. “We person a motivation imperative to amended our students astir sustainability issues similar chromatic bees, which are dying astatine an alarming rate. Bees pollinate overmuch of the nutrient we devour truthful our precise endurance is babelike connected bees.”

Fisher-Maltese, who is starring the probe initiative, said the thought down the VR acquisition was to make a tract travel for students who don’t person entree to resources similar apiaries and beekeepers. “We were excited astir the virtual world exertion due to the fact that we felt similar the acquisition could beryllium truly immersive and marque the students consciousness similar they were there.”

A peculiar screening of the video was held connected the Fairfax Campus successful precocious October earlier it debuted successful 5 nationalist and backstage section simple and secondary schools.

Fisher-Maltese and Gring-Pemble were funded by the National Science Foundation (NSF) for bee research. Many came unneurotic to physique the publication for the virtual world (VR) experience. CEC’s Craig Yu, and his students, machine subject large Quang Vo and machine crippled plan large Jake Wojtecki, besides assisted successful the project.

Fisher-Maltese calls this video acquisition the scaled-down mentation of what they anticipation to create: an interactive, multi-user acquisition wherever the pupil could virtually “be a bee.” Right now, the squad is piloting the video with fourth- and fifth-graders successful Alexandria City and Fairfax County nationalist schools, and utilizing instruments similar a VR sickness questionnaire to get feedback connected whether students experienced question sickness from the VR and a contented measurement to spot if they learned thing from the video. They besides conducted absorption radical interviews with the students and one-on-one interviews with the teachers.

The squad besides had the accidental to stock the video with precocious schoolhouse students successful Technology Teacher Amy Krellwitz’s precocious engineering people astatine Robinson Secondary School successful Fairfax who were looking astatine the acquisition done an engineering lens.

“They had truly bully feedback,” Fisher-Maltese said of the precocious schoolhouse students. “It was a batch of things we were already reasoning of—make it much interactive, marque it much similar a video game, but it was bully to person that confirmation.”

Fisher-Maltese added, “I deliberation the probe volition amusement that this benignant of immersive acquisition demonstrates the convergence of emotion, wonder, and meaningful learning.”

“It genuinely was a fantastic acquisition to spot young people, from simple students done precocious schoolhouse students, getting excited astir chromatic bees and the captious relation they play successful quality security,” said Gring-Pemble. “The passionateness these young radical person for caring for the earthy satellite is what volition yet alteration quality behaviors successful favour of protecting our planet.”

At the peculiar screening, the squad thanked Price, who has supported HBI since its inception successful 2013. “Dan had a imagination of bringing the awe and wonderment of bees to simple schoolhouse students,” said Gring-Pemble. “Our concern has resulted successful [this] coming to fruition.”

“We are incredibly grateful and arrogant of our collaboration with Mason,” said Price. “Our extremity is simply a happier, healthier planet. We deliberation we tin ‘push the needle’ successful that absorption by sparking a consciousness of wonderment successful children.”