Virtual Reality

Virtual Reality for Education

Dr. Piet A.M. Kommers

Faculty of Educational Science and Technology, University of Twente

Zhao Zhiming M.Sc

Department of Educational Information Technology, East China Normal University

Synopsis *

Introduction *

Virtual Reality: State of the Art *

How does Virtual Reality Work? *
Three Levels of VR *
Drawbacks of VR *
From Spatial Emulation into Mental Immersion *
Applications of VR *
Examples of VR-based Learning Experiences *
Shortly indicated existing VR examples *
Virtuality as an overall Metaphor for Media-supported Learning *
VR for Special Education *
VR for the Navigation in Concept Space *

Research Agenda into VR for Education and Training *

The Relation between VR, MOOs and Multimedia *
VR and Artificial Intelligence *
VR, Communication and the User-Interface *
Non-Verbal Interaction for Social Scaffolding in Learning *
Vitual Reality as a Learning Tool *
Spatial Orientations for Episodic Support in Drama *
VR for Improving Constructionism in Learning *
Including Temporal Awareness in VR-based Educational Systems *
Increasing the Immersive Effects in Educational VR *
From Virtual Reality to the Virtual Classroom *
Virtual Libraries for Learning Purposes *
VR-based Courseware and it's Publishing *
VR-based Networks *
User Interfaces for VR-based Courseware *
Using VR in Special Curricular Topics *

Conclusions *

Appendix A: Earlier Research on VR in Education (based upon ERIC’s database ‘91-’97) *

1991 * - 1992 * - 1993 * - 1994 * - 1995 * - 1996 * - 1997 *

Appendix B: Web pages on VR for Education *

VR for Educational Web Sites *
Text-Based Virtual Reality *
Training with Virtual Reality *
Overview of VR Methods, Tools and Recent Technologies *
VRML *
VRML Builders *

Appendix C: AvocaTE, creating Virtual Learning Environments for Vocational Training *

AvocaTE’s Project Problem Definitions and Objectives *

Virtual Environments for Assembly Tasks and Repair Without a Physical Model *
Problem solving and trouble shooting in technical domains *
Needed Communication Skills for Learning in Virtual Learning Environments *
How to arrange robust Learning Facilities for Virtual Environments? *
Which Educational Paradigms do we Need? *

References *

Synopsis

Virtual Reality (VR) becomes a substantial and ubiquitous technology and subsequently penetrates applications for education, learning and training. In addition to multimedia, VR places the user in a 3 dimensional environment. The user feels ‘in the middle of another environment’. Most of the VR systems allow the user to travel and navigate. More promising for learning purposes is to let the user manipulate objects and experience the consequences. This paper introduces the potential impact of ‘immersion’ for learning environments, the current state of the art in VR, its draw-backs, the overall metaphor of virtuality and the most feasible application areas. The main section of the reporting is the research agenda for VR in the next coming years. The recommendations involve VR and collaborative aspects (MOOs), its integration with video conferencing, drama and constructionism, temporal awareness, and finally the integration into special curricular topics. The targeted goal of this paper is the gradual embedding of VR elements in current research and developmental practices. Especially the fast propagation of WWW-based tele-learning can benefit from the VR prospects in the coming years, as VR programs can now be accessed by the most common web browsers like Netscape and Explorer.

Introduction

Throughout the many stages of media they have helped us to extend our perception, imagination and manipulation. VR is just an extra step on the long road bringing the imagination as close and realistic as reality itself.

After the first experiments in the fifties with complex kinesthetic devices like multiple cameras, sensomotoric devices and even smell generators, more elegant head-mounted devices were developed in the early nineties. Both defense research and the computer games industry were the main stimulators of VR so far.

It is hard to describe what VR is not: It encapsulates all previous media, even books, slides, pictures, audio, video and multimedia. The typical contribution of VR is its effect of ‘immersion’; the user feels as if (s)he is in a different world. Both the sensations and the actions of the user should resemble as much as possible to humans in a normal physical environment; seeing, hearing, feeling, smelling, tasting, but also speaking, walking, jumping, swimming, gestures and facial expressions. The VR utopia means that the user does not perceive that a computer detects his behavior, and also that he perceives the real world. The generation of proprioceptive and kinetic stimuli is only possible if the user is placed in a tilted room like the hydraulic controlled cabins for flight simulators. The generation of taste and smell, and the realistic enervation of the human skin as if one touches an object or another person may be one of the most challenging and complex steps for VR to take in the next years.

Augmented reality occurs when the user faces the real world, but on top of that the VR environment superimposes a computer-generated message in order to assist the user to perform the right operations.

VR is a desired technology for those applications in which reality itself does not exist (yet), cannot be accessed, or is too dangerous or expensive to betray.

As for many of the todays VR proponents ‘Reality’ sounds as the only inevitable physical world, they rather prefer ‘Virtual Environments’. This leaves behind the idea that there is mainly one real world. Because of its widespread usage we will maintain the term VR however. Computers in itself are inherently tools to emulate situations and environments which are not there in reality. VR in its current shape suggests the user that he is in a fictitious environment. The next generation of VR suggests that you can really walk around there, and can manipulate and experiment. This environment does not necessarily need the same properties as the real world. There can be different forces, gravity, magnetic fields etc. Also, in contrast to the real solid objects, in VR the objects can be penetrated.

The properties of a good VR are like those of a good teacher; it allows the student to explore the basic laws of a new domain; location, scale, density, interactivity, response, time and level of intensity can be varied. It is not necessary to explain what the VR user sees, hears, feels and finally smells. Also textual descriptions are not optimal for this learning by intervention, as text (and also hypertext) are essentially not apt to describe complex spatial phenomena.

In this sense, VR gives a substantial contribution to interactive learning environments; it combines the realism (like in a video recording) with the manipulative (fictitious) reality like in simulation programs. We may expect that within 10 years, VR is the default presentation mode of computer applications in general.

Besides the visual/auditory and spatial aspects, VR can also provide support in the navigation through concept space. In this case, the dimensions are no longer corresponding to the Euclidean geometry; they can represent mental perspectives, rules and dependencies. Easier said: Virtual space allows traveling through a 3-dimensional concept map. VR is a three-dimensional simulation technique, which becomes more important as

mistakes during the learning process becomes more dramatic

reality itself cannot be accessed

parts of an emulated reality have to be smudged

There are at least four VR aspects of importance for the perception by the learner

The mechanism of avatars. They represent the user in a fictitious environment

The mechanism of affordance. This is the user’s ability to orient in a new world, based upon distinguished features according to Norman (who refers back to J.J. Gibson (See Cunningham, 1989)), affordance is a relation between an object in the world, and the intentions, perceptions and capacities of a person. As an example he mentions that a door with a push button instead of a handle for pulling, has the affordance to push the door.

The man-machine interface gets an ever more prominent position. Initially the user interface was a kind of serving hatch between the user and the system. In case of very interactive systems sometimes one speaks about user intraface; in this case the whole application establishes the manipulation space for the user. The user’s intuition then needs to be sufficient to instruct the user. The user should not need meta-communication in order to understand the program’s potential.

The confrontation between the learner and the new (physical) environment should be ‘immersive’; rather than seeing a flat display, the user should feel himself in the VR. Especially if the task concerns complex three-dimensional orientations like surgery and rescue expeditions in complex areas, then a VR exercise is quite useful before going into reality itself. Psotka, 1995.

Concerning the relevance of VR for education and training two aspects have to be taken into account:

VR is a default component of the user interface in the future. The desktop metaphor was a revolutionary one, as it took the human’s physical (spatial) reality for the organization of information in general. As long as it concerns 2D documents, this is a lucky choice. As soon as the user behaves in a 3D world, a more dynamic representation is needed. Also the acoustic consequences of moving through space, should fit; the sounds’ amplitude, reverberation- and Doppler effects as one recedes or comes closer to the sound source, should resemble the reality.

The second is that the ability to increase realism, also implies the possibility to introduce a specific element of non-realism. One can confront the student with an alien world and make it stepwise more or less realistic. Basic nature laws can be explored, like mechanics, chemistry, electromagnetic fields, etc. Viewed from a constructionist perspective, VR has an important function in the realization of understanding complex processes; the student is allowed to orient in several directions and subsequently find a way through the information space.

Educational VR systems seem to be a natural extension of computer-based simulations nowadays. The basic approach is to allow students to explore and discover the fundamental laws in a new environment and domain. For the initial confrontation with new tasks and for the stage of exercising, this approach seems logical and consequent. The effectiveness of the training for the mastery of the final task in reality is a subject for further research. Based on similar developments in interactive video, multimedia and telematics, it is not desirable to wait-and-see until the technology development has ‘finished’. Educational and training research should keep pace with the newest VR systems and think along its new potential for learning.

Can VR be an Effective Tool for Education or Training? The answer depends partly on one's definition of VR and partly on one's goal for the educational experience. It may not be worth the cost if the goal of the educational experience is simply to memorize facts. However, if the goal of the educational experience is to foster excitement about a subject, or to encourage learning through exploration, or to give students a taste of what it is like to be a research scientist, then VR may be worth the expense.

It seems an interesting option to take the VR technology as a candidate metaphor for learning environments in general. That’s why we introduce the more generic idea of "Virtual Learning Environments’ in later stage of this article. Today it is a developing technology seen primarily in research labs, theme parks, and trade shows. Tomorrow it may be as common as television. Lanier (1989) likes to say that VR is a medium whose only limiting factor is the imagination of the user.

Virtual Reality: State of the Art

VR is a newly emerging tool for scientific visualization that makes possible multisensory, three-dimensional modeling of scientific data. While the emphasis is on visualization, the other senses are added to enhance what the scientist can visualize. Researchers are working to extend the sensory range of what can be perceived in VR. VR technology is still fairly primitive, but advances can be expected to extend the use of VR in telerobotics, telepresence surgery, virtual chemistry, virtual planetary travel, virtual entertainment, and architectural design. Most professional applications of VR are extremely expensive, but some low-cost systems make it possible to get a taste of the VR experience in training settings or even in the consumer situations.

How does Virtual Reality Work?

A breakthrough in VR came with the development of a head-mounted display with two tiny stereoscopic screens positioned just a few inches in front of the eyes. The most popular VR system is one designed by field pioneer, Jaron Lanier (1989). The system features a head-mounted display called the eyephone. Users also wear a dataglove that generates movement and interaction in the virtual environment. Its estimated system price: $205,000. Movement in Cyberspace is simulated by shifting the optics in the field of vision in direct response to movement of certain body parts, such as the head or hand. Turn the head, and the scene shifts accordingly. The sensation is like being inside an artificial world the computer has created. The eyephone uses a set of wide-angle optics that cover approximately 140 degrees, almost the entire horizontal field of view. As the user moves his head to look around, the images shift to create an illusion of movement. The user moves while the virtual world is standing still. The glasses also sense the user's facial expressions through embedded sensors, and that information can control the virtual version of the user's body. A group at NASA developed a system of helmet, glove, and a monochrome three-dimensional reality. The data glove, a key interface device, uses position tracking sensors and fiber optic strands running down each finger, allowing the user to manipulate objects that exist only within the computer simulated environment. When the computer senses that the user's hand is touching a virtual object, the user feels the virtual object. The user can pick up an object and do things with it just as he would do with a real object. The data glove's most obvious application will be in robotics, particularly in the handling of hazardous materials, or by astronauts to control robot repairers from the safety of a spaceship, or from a space station, or even from earth.

Three Levels of VR

Three levels of VR seem to emerge with an increasing amount of impact:

1^st Level: VR is primarily a method to allow computer users to navigate through a fictitious world while continuously presenting an updated view. Many potential applications for learning and training are waiting like allowing the student to explore spatial, mechanics, kinestetics topics. Science and Physics like in ‘Newton’s World’. Beyond the travel through worlds of geometric objects, also more organic shapes can be traveled through like organic tissues, sediment layers, large molecules and for instance the more complex orientation in airplanes cable wiring. (See Boeing’s VR technique for its assembly of 747 electric wiring).

2^nd Level: VR as the 3D successor of the desktop metaphor. As ever more documents and data files need a time dimension (animations and the documents’ evolution through time), VR will become the defacto standard for navigation.

3^rd Level: This will be the most pervasive for education. VR becomes the encompassing way to arrange learning events and learning transactions. Examples are

Instead of communicating with a real real-time teacher, the student can talk with a virtual teacher; it is not necessary to know who is exactly your counterpart. It can be a real teacher of professor, however it can also be an expert, co-student or a combination of several people. It remains essential however that you as a student can always feel as if you are in a learning environment with feedback, explanations and negotiation about meaning and consequences.

Instead of working with a real machinery or expensive equipment, students may finally work with virtual ones. In case it concerns the training in an administrative environment, the fictitious office is the environment. The virtuality aspect should not only be seen as a compromise. It is also an advantage in order to regulate the level of complexity. Also, in case of mistakes, the damage and danger will be reduced. For a more complex rationale, see the AVocaTE project proposal can be seen in Appendix C.

Instead of practicalities and preservice training, the future student can exercise with fictitious cases. However, as the computer system will search for similar students at a distance, it will allow them to take roles and meet realistic social scenarios even when they have been arranged. The only difference with the real situatie is that commercial and financial connotations have been omitted.

Though the existing literature is mainly focussing the methodological and tool aspects of the first two levels, this third level seems to have the future. However for to-morrows research agenda, this line may still be a bit too advantageous at the moment. It will be taken as a new educational scenario finally.

Drawbacks of VR

Despite enormous potential practical application, VR, in its current state, has drawbacks. It is still extremely expensive, the graphics are still cartoonish, and there is still a slight, but perceptible time lag between the user's body movements and their translation in Cyberspace. The equipment the user must wear, such as headgear, gloves, and other devices, needs refinement. At this early stage in the development of VR, no one knows what the long-term effect of using head-mounted displays might be on human eyes or what the possible psychological effect might be from spending too much time in Cyberspace. People using VR head gear sometimes complain about chronic fatigue, a lack of initiative, drowsiness, irritability, or nausea after interacting with a virtual environment for a long time. We do not know how much each of these symptoms depends on the characteristics of the VR systems themselves, or on the characteristics of the individuals using the systems.

From Spatial Emulation into Mental Immersion

VR is a computer-generated reality in which the user feels as if (s)he is in a three-dimensional space. It can create a simulated reality or a completely fictitious reality. The two primary application fields are entertainment and training. Beier (1994, 1995) and Beier (July 1996, in http://www-vrl.umich.edu/intro.html) describes VR as follows:

….. The term 'Virtual Reality' (VR) was initially coined by Jaron Lanier, founder of VPL Research (1989). Other related terms include 'Artificial Reality' (Myron Krueger, 1970s), 'Cyberspace' (William Gibson, 1984), and, more recently, 'Virtual Worlds' and 'Virtual Environments' (1990s). Today, 'VR' is used in a variety of ways and often in a confusing and misleading manner. Originally, the term referred to 'Immersive VR.' In immersive VR, the user becomes fully immersed in an artificial, three-dimensional world that is completely generated by a computer.

The optimal immersion effect of VR needs a data glove, and stereoscopic goggles, which are both wired to the computer; with the glove you can manipulate computer-generated objects that are displayed on tiny monitors inside the goggles. For airplane-, space and fast train pilots, these realistic effects are essential, as it is this total perception field that gives them the critical information about the behavior of the vehicle and the appearance of the environment. For even more realistic feedback, also motional movements should be generated in order to provide proprioceptive and kinesthetic experiences.

An artificial reality that projects the user into a 3-D space generated by the computer. True VR systems require the use of a unique kind of glove, called. The glove lets users point to and.

VR can be used to create any illusion of reality or imagined reality and is used both for. VR has been around for some time now. For example, flight simulators, used to train airplane pilots and astronauts, have provided a very realistic simulation of the environment, albeit extremely expensive.

A variation of VR, known as unencumbered VR or computer automatic virtual environment (CAVE), is becoming popular for entertainment. For example, using a glove, but not goggles, you can play a simulated ballgame such as volleyball or basketball. A video camera captures your movements while you watch yourself on a large screen. You hit a simulated ball that is passed to you by your on-screen opponent and play the game as if it were real.

The term is also used for computer games and interactive environments on the Web that allow you to move from one room or area to another. They of course lack the 360-degree reality that comes from wearing the glove and goggles. See HMD, CAVE, 6DOF, cyberspace and VRML.

According to Beier (1996), the next application fields for VR are indicated:

……Useful applications of VR include training in a variety of areas (military, medical, equipment operation, etc.), education, design evaluation (virtual prototyping), architectural walk-through, human factors and ergonomic studies, simulation of assembly sequences and maintenance tasks, assistance for the handicapped, study and treatment of phobias (e.g., fear of height), entertainment, and much more.

Applications of VR

Applications for VR are many. Surgeons may soon use VR to walk through the brain or rehearse a surgical operation on a virtual patient. Just as flight simulators are now an integral part of pilot training, so surgical simulators will revolutionize medical training. VR now makes possible telepresence, scientific exploration, and discovery. For example, the Jason Project for school children features both telepresence (the feeling of being in a location other than one's actual location) and teleoperation (controlling a robot submarine) (McLellan, 1995). The Jason Project, now in its sixth year, was designed to generate excitement about studying science, mathematics, and technology. NASA has a telepresence educational program that uses the Telepresence-controlled Remotely Operated underwater Vehicle (TROV) deployed in Antarctica. By means of distributed computer control architecture developed at NASA, school children in classrooms across the United States can take turns driving the TROV in Antarctica. Someday scientists expect to explore celestial bodies and check out lakes beneath the Antarctic ice pack using VR applications. Disabled persons, through prosthetic interfaces, may one day use tele-robotics to do tasks that are now only a dream; three-D sound may one day provide great applications for the blind.

Examples of VR-based Learning Experiences

The "Revival of the Virtual Lathe" is one of the eye-catching applications for VR, ready to be applied in learning settings. Already during the SIGGRAPH '92 conference in Chicago, IL, Michael Deering from Sun Microsystems presented the "Virtual Lathe", a screen-based VR experiment that used a head-tracked stereo display system and a 3D mouse in the shape of a rod. By touching the virtual stock with the tip of the physical rod, virtual material was cut away accompanied by virtual sparks and grinding sound. The experiment has been described in Deering (1992).

Shortly indicated existing VR examples

Just to give a global impression of the currently available VR application domains, the list below. For further explanations see http://www-vrl.umich.edu/projects.html.

Ship Motion Simulation

Color Coded Stereo Vision in VRML

Robots in Manufacturing Applications

Virtual Prototyping of Automotive Interiors

Virtual Simulation of Ship Production Processes

Architectural Walk-Through: The Barcelona Pavilion

Modeling of Underwater Shipwrecks

Accident Simulation

Virtual Prototyping of a Sailing Yacht

Scientific Visualization in VR

Architectural Walk-Through: Media Union

Augmented Reality in Design, Manufacturing, and Maintenance

Geometry Decimation, Stitching, and Editing

Flexible and Precise Texture Mapping

Modeling of Behavior and Functionality

Sample VRML Models (students projects from course EECS 498)

Hazard Detection using Augmented Reality

Coronal Mass Ejection Visualization

Fetus Visualization

Detroit Midfield Terminal Project

The site http://www-vrl.engin.umich.edu/~saha/mse490/java.html shows Java-independent viewing mechanisms for crystalline and quasi crystalline structures stacking in three dimensional space using polyhedra with five fold symmetry in VR. It allows the user to rotate crystal grids and explore its complexity and regularities.

Virtuality as an overall Metaphor for Media-supported Learning

The technology of VR in the sense of complete senso-motoric immersion as described in our introduction will slowly penetrate in the highly specialized areas of training areas. The more generic approach of vicarious learning and learning at a distance will arrive quite soon for the broader fields of education and instruction. Its message is that learning becomes an inherent and omnipresent element in daily life: The job, leisure time and entertainment situations. Virtuality in this context means that the learning arrangements do not necessarily need the physical presence of schooling institutes, teachers, co-students, rosters, books etc. It is just the learner’s motivation to learn and his access to on-line learning facilities with thousands of potential learning partners (both tutors and tutees) on the web.

.. .. Classes taught over computer networks (the Internet) will remake today's high schools. Education on demand is becoming a virtual reality for regular, homebound, hospitalized, and less motivated students. Reassigning disobedient, unwilling students to an off-campus computer communications lab will significantly improve attendance, discipline, and student performance.

Clarence M., Edwards, Jr. (1995)

The term "Virtual Learning Environments" highlights the broader scope of virtuality; it is not only the physical immersion (as if being in another physical world), but it is the fact that the media around you enable the full information, exploration, communication and feedback, as if you are in a well-organized classroom.

VR for Special Education

Woodward (1992) identified as part of a 3-year study emerging trends in technology for special education. His paper addresses the possible contributions of VR technology to educational services for students with disabilities. An example of the use of VR in medical imaging introduces the paper and leads to a brief review of the history of interactive computing and the development of VR as a special discipline out of stereoscopy and computer science. The toy industry is expected to downsize existing systems for the home market and exploit the commercial potential of VR. Possible applications for instruction of persons with disabilities are discussed in light of both the intuitive appeal of the technology and mixed findings on the effectiveness of simulations as educational interventions and the lack of special education students as subjects in such research. The importance of ensuring equitable access to advanced technologies for students with disabilities is stressed.

VR for the Navigation in Concept Space

Salis and Pantelidis (1997) (HTTP://eastnet.educ.ecu.edu/vr/vrits/2-4salas.htm) claim that VR has the potential to change the students’ learning, unless we can integrate it into teachers’ instructional repertoire. Also they consider it as vital to know which domain and explicit learning processes can be affected. They see cooperation among teachers as helpful before they can effectively make use of the pre-designed VR lesson plans. In order to classify VR environments in an Educational meaningful way Salis and Pantelidis discern the next 3 dimensions

The level of immersion (Windowing versus head-mounted displays)

The level of interaction (Navigation versus manipulation)

The level of entities (Information- via object into concept orientation)

The level of concrete versus abstractness (within the concept-orientation approach the VR environment may vary between perceptual versus mental representations)

Salis and Pantelidis see the mental (re)-orientations of the students as vital for the final learning effect. VR as an abstract representation of conceptual relations to be learned is the final merit in order to arrange constructivistic learning experiences. The effect of learners becoming ever more conscious about one’s characteristic tendencies in travelling through and in manipulating conceptual structures is the most essential benefit from VR-based learning tools in their view. They conclude:

….. Walkthrough systems are, as we have emphasized, tools that can stimulate the learner to apply metacognitive strategies. The fact that the student retains control of the manipulation of objects is very important and recalls the theory of constructivism. In outlining some of the characteristic features of walkthrough systems that make them promising teaching tools, we have discussed the key points of manipulations, navigation, and, so that the student may focus on the elements of primary importance, the exclusion of secondary elements. We have also indicated the pedagogical limits of walkthrough systems as used in education, and seen that those systems could be helped by bringing in additional background materials, and other aids to comprehension. If we consider the strategies of manipulation and navigation as part of a virtual space for the acquisition of knowledge, it becomes important to begin to look for better correspondence between the content, the external aids, and the technical support that allow the interaction. While this point is based on the design, it emphasizes the need for studies that examine how subjects move when placed in a virtual environment.

Research Agenda into VR for Education and Training

Beyond the necessary improvements of VR technologies, a number of specific educational and training needs can be summarized from the reviewed ERIC inventories of the research between 1991 and 1996. Rather than theory-driven questions, there is an ongoing demand for the design and development of solutions in terms of software programs, didactic integration and consolidation of new VR ideas into solid curricular prescriptions.

The Relation between VR, MOOs and Multimedia

As education faces an ever increasing speed of new media, we may expect that ICT specialists in the schooling institutes will ask themselves

What is the added value of VR on top of multimedia environments?

What are the costs and benefits of migrating from MM to VR?

Educational MOO (EdMOO) systems were created in mid-1995 as an environment for teachers to experience the text based VR environment offered by a Multi-user domain, Object-Oriented (MOO) and intended to provide an environment for discussing education and training issues, as well as to possibly be supported by an online document library. EdMOO permits participants in an online meeting to display documents, graphics, sounds, movies, and any of the other media supported by Netscape, to others in the same virtual place. Typical MOO problems that were evident in the initial EdMOO environment included: noise in a crowded room; problems for players being unable or reluctant to type in real time; and the need for powerful and flexible user tools. The questions to be answered further are:

How can MOOs benefit further from the rapid progress in VR technologies?

Which specific communication process between teachers and students can be facilitated by VR-based MOOs?

VR and Artificial Intelligence

Beyond the question how to benefit from spatial explorations, all of the other disciplines around the educational science and industrial training see if they have essentially complementary solutions for the remaining problems in learning practice. One of the intriguing questions coming up after having read McLellan’s initial aspiration is:

To what extent will explicit knowledge-based (rules and facts) prescriptions finally bring VR at the level of robustness and self-explanatory?

VR, Communication and the User-Interface

Turbee (1997) describes MOOs as social environments in a text-based VR where people gather to chat with friends, meet new people, and help build the MOO. Users connect from anywhere in the world and communicate with one another in real time. Users can create rooms, objects, and programs that recreate in text anything the user might imagine. EdMOOs have an academic theme and use a variety of MOO communication tools such as internal e-mail, newspapers, documents, blackboards, and classrooms to accommodate a variety of teaching styles. Teachers can use these tools in harmony with the goals for the class while exploiting the nature of the MOO as a student-centered learning environment.

Research questions are:

How can MOOs as virtual social environments be explored by teachers in order to orient students in complex social processes like idea generation, -selection and –combination, for the sake of learning and cognitive maturation?

How can MOOs assists in the integration and mutual reconciliation between job performance and learning?

To which extent and how can MOOs facilitate the process of distributed knowledge in a learning organization?

Which are adequate instructional design strategies for integrating the benefits of MOOs in courseware design?

What is the added value of MOO technologies for corporate communication and public information systems?

Non-Verbal Interaction for Social Scaffolding in Learning

How to improve the non-verbal and social communication between partners in the learning process using expressive interaction devices? Thalmann (1994) describes the need for additional techniques in order to include facial animations (suggesting visual access to a remote human partner) in order to inform the user about the more expressive and emotional aspects in learning dialogues:

Which are relevant parameters in the variety of learning transactions between students and media, and how can they effectively be expressed in facial modalities?

How can data input accessories like a simple script, a multi-input musical keyboard, a gesture dialogue from the dataglove, or some other type of interactive physical or virtual device be integrated so that they become a meaningful message for the other partner in a learning session?

Vitual Reality as a Learning Tool

Merickel’s (1992) hypothesis was that children's cognitive abilities could be enhanced by having them develop, displace, transform, and interact with 2D and 3D computer-generated models. The results of the project showed that spatially-related problem-solving abilities of children are influenced by training in visualization and mental manipulation of two dimensional figures and displacement and transformation of mental images of three dimensional objects. Further research regarding computer workstation graphic-based treatments and perceived realism and their relationship to problem solving should be undertaken. Merickel’s conclusion was that the technology known as VR is highly promising and deserves extensive development as an instructional/training tool. The remaining research questions are:

Is it sufficient to confront student once with a VR/cyberspace system, or should it be a recurring element in their weekly curriculum?

To what extent does the increased spatially-related problem-solving ability affect the long-term cognitive repertoire, and how severe is the constraint in problem solving in real-life situations?

Spatial Orientations for Episodic Support in Drama

Blum (1994) explored how VR may effect drama in education.

Does the students’ ability to explore story scenarios and rethorics improve significantly as they make spatial excursions in VR?

In how far is this capacity increased through the teacher’s change in attitude and trust in the students’ autonomy?

VR for Improving Constructionism in Learning

Dede (1992, 1996) has so far focussed on the evolution in constructivistic learning environments. He examined the collaboration of simulated software models, virtual environments, and evolving mental models via immersion in artificial realities. The underlying questions that still needs further exploration and experimental research are

Which are the precise didactic, instructional and cognitive psychological arguments in order to decide between the objectivistic and constructivistic interaction modes?

To what extent can students adapt their learning style to non-matching instructional paradigms?

Including Temporal Awareness in VR-based Educational Systems

VR environments can support the student’s spatial but also his temporal awareness. User perceptions of time affects user acceptance, ease of use, and the level of realism of a virtual learning environment. There is a threshold about to be crossed in VR that may have a profound effect on the way stories are generated and experienced. We need new design methods which are effective in influencing students’ perceptions of time in virtual learning environments. The use of temporal cues for instance in medical education is vital for diagnosing skills and also for science education in general.

How can we effectively design and control parameters like space, duration and power in didactic VR programs?

How can we enable students at secondary and tertiary levels to be actively involved in perceiving, controlling and reflecting upon these time-related variables during their learning?

It is the hypothesis that VR makes immediate sense because what a participant sees and hears has a meaning that does not require explanation. Text does not fare well on VR because text is not constructed for interaction; the VR analog of text is natural speech. Rather than teaching a structure of symbols, such as algebra, VR will first teach meaning through experience, then the symbolic abstraction of those experiences. VR is a natural interface with abstractions. According to Bricken (1990), no one has any idea what extended exposure to high quality VR is like or other possible negative impacts, but VR will be commonplace in 20 years. Though we are seven years later now, Bricken’s ideas still hold.

Increasing the Immersive Effects in Educational VR

Dennen & Branch (1995) consider VR as an immersive, interactive medium that manipulates the senses in order to provide users with simulated experiences in computer-generated worlds. The visual design of VR is an important issue, but literature stresses the medium's instructional potential rather than setting forth a protocol for designing virtual environments. Furthermore, VR is often considered a solution in search of a problem instead of a viable instructional tool. To counteract this notion, a study of technology designers, media experts, and instructional designers was conducted to share ideas and generate data regarding what constitutes an Instructional Virtual Environment (IVE), when one should be used, how best to design one, who should be involved in the design process, and how to evaluate one.

We expect that survey studies in Curriculum- and Instructional Technology are needed to identify the more essential subject areas in Secondary School curricula which can benefit from the VR immersion

Describing VR technology and VR research on education and training, Psotka (1995) focuses on immersion as the key added value of VR.

Which cognitive variables are connected to immersion?

How is it generated in synthetic environments and which are its benefits?

What is the value of tracked, immersive visual displays over non-immersive simulations?

Though VR is defined as interactive, it does not require full immersion. IVEs (Interactive Virtual Environments) should be used in educational situations requiring experience in particular settings, especially to present spatial or abstract information because of the advantages of sensorial feedback.

Should IVEs inherently consider constructivist learning principles?

Do they require a high level of user interaction?

Do they require support mastery learning?

Should the design of IVEs involve multi-disciplinary teams, including instructional designers, subject matter experts, end users, computer experts, ergonomic specialists, and artists?

Should evaluators study IVEs very thoroughly, examining all aspects of the environment and using many different methods?

From Virtual Reality to the Virtual Classroom

Where VR is the metaphor for the user-system interaction at an individual level; the Virtual Classroom is the metaphor for the coming tele-presence both of students, teachers and even the schooling institute, and should further support the becoming of the so-called "Studiehuis". It should allow students to participate in virtual classroom environments by using computer teleconferencing and collaborative techniques. The requested evidences that need a closer and more specific research agenda are:

student collaboration,

note taking,

question answering capabilities,

project-driven lesson plans,

learning theory based upon construtionism,

comparisons with other distance learning environments,

alternative testing and assessment methods,

workforce training, and

permanently catching up with changing technology issues

Virtual Classrooms need newly defined facilities for information retrieval and dissemination. Maurer & Schneider (1994) claim that they should offer virtual journeys through the campus, and they need mainly two techniques for incorporating a trip into a hypermedia system. The less complex walk-through consists of virtual walks on a given network of paths, and with the fly-through, where movement is not restricted to given paths and places. The VR-based hypermedia system can be extended to include an expert system, which has the capacity to deal with the decision making process of prospective students. An expert system, which contains declarative and procedural knowledge about the problem field, can assume the role of a counselor by assisting students in laying out their course options. Another application of VR-based hypermedia they distinguish is the provision of information about university-sourced expertise and equipment available to the public, or groups from media, industry and government. The UTICS project will span several years and there remains a number of design problems to be solved, including image matching and the degree of detail to be incorporated in the walk- and fly-through systems. We should also study the implications of VR for Elementary and Secondary Education. Highlights include VR software evaluation, hardware evaluation, computer-based curriculum objectives which could use VR, and keeping current with new uses of VR.

Virtual Libraries for Learning Purposes

A library has the capacity to deliver much more than just its locally stored and owned resources. By using telecommunications, information can be sought from online databases and from other pupils in schools across the world. We need closer explanations on the

use of commercial online databases in schools;

use of telecommunications by pupils to gather information from other pupils;

virtual school library and the role of the librarian;

use of MOO (Multi-User Object Oriented) virtual environments in academic libraries to enhance reference services.

Typical highlights to be included are the development of multi-user database (MUD) technology from gaming to non-recreational settings, programming issues, collaborative MOOs, MOOs as distinguished from other types of VR, audio and video capability, and examples.

VR-based Courseware and it's Publishing

Research into the educational effectiveness of textbooks focuses on a model of a virtual textbook that relies on hypermedia. Highlights include

changing roles of teachers, students, and content;

systemwide features of the virtual textbook, including interface and object-oriented design;

classroom environment, sequencing, and a prototype.

VR-based Networks

Dede (1996) describes four forms of expression that are reshaping traditional distance education into a new instructional model: Knowledge webs, virtual communities, synthetic environments and sensory immersion. Based on Dede’s distinction, the next four questions can be raised:

How can knowledge webs optimally enable distributed access to information?

Are virtual communities a satisfactory complement to face-to-face interactions?

How can synthetic environments like VR facilitate learning-by-doing?

Does sensory immersion help learners in grasping reality through illusion?

User Interfaces for VR-based Courseware

Winn (1995) at the Human Interface Technology Laboratory at the University of Washington uses VEs for specific instructional purposes and also uses the construction of VEs by students as a way for them to learn content. The design of VEs draws guidance from research in human factors and from the general principles of semiotics. Semiotic theory rests on the proposition that we cannot know the world as it truly is, but only through signs. In the conceptual framework for VEs, knowledge is constructed from information by students. A constructivist learning paradigm was taken as a base. The next questions can be formulated upon William’s work so far:

Work in the design and construction of virtual environments (VEs) is described from the standpoint of semiotic theory.

How can well-constructed visual worlds create in a person the feelings and cognitions that arise from being in the natural world itself?

How can interactions with computer-constructed VEs be mediated through signs?

How can the sense of presence engendered by VEs can be increased through the manipulation of signs by learners?

Steuer (1992) defined VR as a particular type of experience (in terms of presence and telepresence) rather than as a collection of hardware.

Can, and how can media technologies be classified and studied in terms of vividness and interactivity?

Shlechter (1992) examines the effectiveness of SIMNET (Simulation Networking), a VR training simulation system, combined with a program of role-playing activities for helping Army classes to master the conditional knowledge needed for successful field performance. The question remains however:

Do active forms of learning like present in (virtual) networks for simulation promote higher order cognitive thinking? And why?

McLellan (1993) claims that VR technology offers the promise of interaction with a computer-based environment that engages visual, auditory, and tactile perception. She launches three interrelated VR design topics that are particularly relevant to visual literacy.

Avatars: agents that appear in a virtual world representing the user.

Affordances: (According to the theory of ecological psychology of J. J. Gibson), the distinctive features of a thing that help distinguish it from other things that it is not. As such, they provide strong clues to the operations of things.

Interfaces for both input and output link the user to the virtual world that exists only digitally.

Based on McLellan’s work, the following research questions arise

Are the VR interfaces like available in computer games adequate for VR learning environments?

How should the foregoing design topics be applied by designers who explore the potential of the new VR medium?

Using VR in Special Curricular Topics

Jacobson (1991) takes the position that CyberArts(TM) is the new frontier in creativity, where the worlds of science and art meet. Computer technologies, visual design, music and sound, education and entertainment merge to form the new artistic territory of interactive multimedia. This diverse collection of essays, articles, and commentaries investigates the creative dimension where technologists and artists apply emerging interactive, multimedia tools and techniques to: (1) music; (2) graphics; (3) animation; (4) publishing; (5) video; (6) theater; (7) theme parks; (8) toys and games; and (9) VR. Multimedia tools take an important place, and go together with an additional awareness for color, sound, facial gestures and gaming strategies.

Winn & Bricken (1992) explored the use of virtual VR to help students learn highlights the use of VR with elementary algebra.

Research questions are:

Which new, more specific types of learning theories are required in order to describe and predict better the specific effects of VR in particular learning tasks across schooling curricula?

To what extent do VR-based learning environments elicit curriculum designers to restructure traditional topics, like for instance ‘spatial algebra’ in case of the work of Winn & Bricken, or CyberArts in case of Jacobson?

Having access to the more artistic, creative and expressive modalities in computer systems: Which are newly emerging skills to be mastered before students can benefit from them in their communication and report activities?

Conclusions

VR has arrived a stage of concrete application in the areas of specialized training equipment where spatial and kinesthetic awareness is crucial. The third dimension however gradually becomes a default attribute of human-computer interaction and offers affordance to new metaphors in multimedia learning programs. Besides travelling and navigation, the learner is invited to manipulate and physically explore concrete but also the more abstract entities like categories, query attributes, facts and rules. Also VR contributes to bring virtuality as an overall characteristic in the learning community, like virtual (remote, asynchronous and maybe anonymous) learning partners. Speaking about the ‘virtual’ classroom we may think of de-institutionalized schools, learning at home, during the job and in concertation with third parties who have not a primary mission to teach. VR becomes a substantial and ubiquitous technology and subsequently penetrates applications for education, learning and training. In addition to multimedia, VR places the user in a 3 dimensional environment. The user feels ‘in the middle of another environment’. Most of the VR systems allow the user to travel and navigate. More promising for learning purposes is to let the user manipulate objects and experience the consequences. This paper introduces the potential impact of ‘immersion’ for learning environments, the current state of the art in VR, its draw-backs, the overall metaphor of virtuality and the most feasible application areas. The most urgent areas for further research are VR and collaborative aspects (MOOs), its integration with video conferencing, drama and constructionism, temporal awareness, and finally the integration into special curricular topics. Finally we plead to gradually embed VR elements in the current and coming research plans and developmental practices. Especially the fast propagation of WWW-based tele-learning can benefit from the VR prospects in the coming years, as VR programs can now be accessed by the most common web browsers like Netscape and Explorer.