Using cutting-edge virtual reality technology, ASU is one step closer toward revolutionizing the learning experience.
Through a collaboration with the company Dreamscape Immersive, ASU has introduced an innovative learning experience called Dreamscape Learn, a project that fuses virtual reality technology with interactive, narrative-style teaching.
"You become part of a story as a character in VR, so you can experience things as a part of the story," said Michael Angilletta, the associate dean for learning innovation at EdPlus at ASU and a collaborator for the Dreamscape Learn project.
The project began when ASU President Michael Crow met with Walter Parkes, the co-founder of Dreamscape Immersive. Previously, Dreamscape programs had only been applied to the entertainment industry, but this meeting laid the foundation for an academic partnership that would benefit ASU students.
"Instead of you coming to a classroom where I lecture to you about what biologists have done ... I'm going to take you to a place where you can go into VR and you could become a biologist," Angilletta said.
When working on introducing Dreamscape Learn for use, the university collaborated with experts in artificial intelligence and education, fine-tuning the program to fit student needs.
One result of this collaboration is the immersive storytelling element of the program. Simulating different scenarios through VR helps to guide students through new concepts as they interact with the virtual world.
"One goal is we want to make learning more engaging," Angilletta said. "We want students to want to learn."
Once the project was launched in the Spring of 2022, ASU conducted an experimental study with 700 student participants, according to Angilletta. Half of these students were taught a biology course using the traditional textbook and lecture approach, while the other half were taught through Dreamscape Learn. The results were promising.
"What we found is that students in the Dreamscape Learn curriculum were nearly twice as likely to get an A in the lab assignments than students in the traditional curriculum," Angilletta said. "Even though those assignments were quantitatively more rigorous than the old assignments."
Additionally, people from different demographic backgrounds were balanced between the two learning groups to reduce potential biases from the results.
Zoya Khan is a sophomore studying economics who participated in the Dreamscape Learn program last semester.
"It felt like being inside a video game, but an educational one," Khan said. "Even though it was educational, they somehow managed to make it fun."
While technology is often criticized for reducing engagement between students, the virtual reality elements of Dreamscape Learn had the opposite effect for Khan.
"It was hard to zone out like students usually do in classes ... because you were literally looking at everything you were studying," Khan said. "This was like a virtual trip that we all went to."
Her fascination goes beyond her own fields of study, as she wishes this technology could be incorporated into other subjects such as statistics, economics or psychology.
Dreamscape Learn is setting up a framework for a future where education is no longer about absorbing lectures or taking exams, but about experiencing information personally.
"It was like getting a glimpse of how the future is going to be," said Khan.
Edited by River Graziano, Sophia Braccio and Madeline Schmitke.
Reach the reporter at aaror111@asu.edu.
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