As this is my first ClassVR blog post, I’ll introduce myself- I’m Zoe, another one of Avantis’ Educational Specialists and former teachers. As part of my role, I’ll be getting schools started with their headsets, seeing how they are being used and along the way picking up lots of ideas and practical examples of their use in the classroom, which I will share right here!
In an academy far far away…
This week I had the pleasure of setting up ClassVR at St Wilfrid’s C of E Academy in Blackburn. Lead Teacher in New Technologies, Nathan Ashman, is already buzzing with ideas of how to introduce Virtual Reality to the classroom to bring learning to life. Equipped with a 360 camera, the school has a number of their very own 360 images ready to go. We saved one as a resource on the ClassConnect website, immediately sent it to the ClassVR headsets and were delighted to see that it worked perfectly! The ability to add your own content quickly and easily means that the possibilities really are endless when it comes to Virtual Reality experiences.
I can’t quite believe that this technology is becoming a reality for teachers and students right now. I have absolutely loved coming up with teaching and learning ideas around our VR and AR experiences, as have the rest of the team; however, for me, the next step is even more exciting… actually seeing and hearing about real-life experiences with ClassVR! I still remember some magic moments from my teaching days: schools trips, historical re-enactments, topic days and I love knowing that thanks to VR and AR experiences, there will be more and more ‘wow moments’ created in schools far and wide.
When we first introduced ClassVR at BETT in January, it was incredible seeing so many people ‘Ooh’, ‘Ah’ and ‘Wow!’ when having a go. The only thing to top this was seeing children’s reactions. Squeals of delight, jumps in the air and pleads to see ‘just one more’ made me feel so incredibly lucky to be a part of this and so very excited about the next chapter.
