Augmented reality (AR) is an emerging form of experience in which the real world is enhanced by computer-generated content specific to a location and to an activity. Today, AR applications have become portable and available on mobile devices. AR is beginning to change news, entertainment, sports, e-commerce, travel, museums, architecture, and marketing in tangible, exciting ways. In education and training, AR has the potential to make ubiquitous learning a reality, allowing learners to gain immediate access to a wide range of location-specific information from various sources. The 2010 Horizon Report predicts that the use of simple AR in education will be widespread within 2 to 3 years on US college campuses.
Below is a presentation I recently gave at the 2011 Creating Futures Through Technology Conference (CFTTC) in Biloxi, Mississippi. In my presentation, I introduced the concept of AR, discussed the recent AR developments, examined the impact of AR on society, and discussed the implications of AR for education. Please feel free to offer your comments and suggestions. Thanks.
Learning Technologies
A wonderful presentation on augmented reality in education. I do believe we are beginning to see our society transition into this type of media and it will only increase with time. Recently in the Memphis Commercial Appeal they have begun using the QR Codes for pictures and I downloaded the app I-nigma 4 so I code view them. That week I allowed my students to take the newspaper and scan the codes with my iPhone 4 so they could observe the results. In March of 2010, I received an E-mail from Delta Airlines to download my boarding pass to my cell phone to receive bonus miles, but I was reluctant and did not trust the QR code out of ignorance. Now they are becomming more commonly used for this purpose.
In the presentation I saw where you could have the augmented experience if you visited the IronMan 2 website which I did. It was truely amazing. I also visited ZooBurst and created an account so I could participate in the experience of being inside of a pop-up book. I believe my students would be facinated if I made this as an assignment for them, and the wheels in my head are turning about how I could get a classroom set of web cameras.
I read from the presentation that in the future we will see augmented reality everywhere and that in 2 to 3 years it will be widespread in education. Prior to reading the blog and viewing the presentation I did not have a clear understanding of what augmented reality was and I still have a lot of questions. However, after seeing the presentation I realize I have begun to see it being used in sociiety mostly from the television media. Personally I have not seen it in education, but I do believe it is being used in other regions of the country for training. Such as in surgery simulations for training exercises. Currently we are seeing augmented reality being used on television and if that is an indication of how we will be using it in the future it will be popping up in government offices, real estate sales, hospitals, police stations, and the possibilities are limitless.