What Will Education Look Like In The Virtual Reality Metaverse?

I’ve recently started exploring what education and professional development could look like in the virtual reality Metaverse after my friend Mike Flynn suggested that we try it out. I made a series of eight videos to demonstrate this as a proof of concept. Consider that while this might seem crazy or unnecessary right now, if you watched something like this with a Zoom classroom in 2019, it might have felt similarly.

I am using an Oculus Quest 2 with the Horizons Workrooms software. It’s worth noting that the audio of me talking comes from the headset, so it’s a decent quality microphone.

Each video below shows you what I’m seeing in my VR headset on top and what it looks like in real life below. Note that whenever it is black on the VR headset view, I’m actually seeing my room via the tiny cameras in the headset. I assume that this is not being recorded for privacy reasons.

 

Here’s what what the desk environment looks like. You can define the size of your desk and the height so it’s fairly flexible.

 

There are currently three options for the room layout and several more for the room design. You can currently customize the room with one logo, one vertical poster, and one horizontal poster.

 

There’s a free program called Oculus Remote Desktop that you can download and then share whatever’s on your computer screen in this virtual meeting room. So while this gives you lots of flexibility, you still have to use your real life mouse and keyboard to manipulate the image. At first I thought I might be able to touch the screen like my touchscreen Surface Pro. Not quite there yet.

 

Each person has access to the shared whiteboard at their desk. This is helpful for interaction but not ideal for allowing everyone to work individually.

 

You can position the virtual whiteboard wherever you want in the room.

 

This virtual whiteboard feels a lot like a SMART Board.

 

Adding images is likely the easiest way to bring problems into this virtual meeting space. Unfortunately you currently have to add them via web browser ahead of time to be able to access them within the meeting room.

 

The methods for sharing student work are not great yet, but there are some workarounds that give you an idea of what’s possible.

 

Mike and I met to play around and see what was possible. He was in another state than me, but it felt much more together than a Zoom meeting. As Mike mentioned, this might be the first ever number talk in the metaverse.

This second video is me exploring what doing an Open Middle problem might be like.

 

Does the video feel as jerky in when you’re using the headset?
The video might feel a bit jerky as a spectator, but while wearing them it does not feel that way. My eyes and my head work together and it feels very smooth. That doesn’t come across so much in the video experience.

Is it nauseating?
Most motion based virtual reality games (and every single virtual reality ride like Star Tours) makes me extremely nauseous these days. Fortunately, this doesn’t make me feel that way at all.

What else should we know?
The battery life is still not that great so the headset would need to be recharged every few hours. It definitely can’t make it through the whole day. It also really messes up your hair. It gives you something of an inverted mohawk. I don’t wear glasses with it but you need to insert a provided adapter to comfortably wear it.

What are the dimensions of the whiteboard in Horizon Workrooms?
As best as I can determine, when you take an image that is 6975 x 1856 and expand it, it basically fills the entire whiteboard. The ratio is close to 3.75 to 1 but not exact.

 

Here’s my growing wish list of features I would find very useful that don’t currently exist:

Virtual Manipulatives
It would be amazing if we could import virtual tools to use in this space. Imagine base-10 blocks, shapes, number tiles, or even a calculator. I imagine this will come one day, but it’s not here yet.

Individual Desk Whiteboards
Currently everyone has access to a shared whiteboard. So everyone is working on the same writing space at the same time. That’s great for a meeting and less great for a classroom. It’d be even better if each student could have their own whiteboard and then the facilitator could select the one to display and share.

Viewing Other People’s Whiteboards
Building on the last idea, I wish there was a way to see what other people were doing with their whiteboard. I totally get that it’s most likely related to privacy concerns, but as a teacher I’d love to be able to walk around the virtual space and see what students are doing. That currently is not possible unless everyone is working on the same whiteboard at the same time. Then you’d have to partition it into sections so each person could work in their same area.

Method For Recording Room View
Right now there’s no easy way to record the whole room. As far as I can tell, you can only record what you see as a participant. I think I may be able to add a fake participant and record that, but I haven’t tried it yet.

 

If you’re feeling a combination of awe and terror after watching those videos, join the club. That seems to be the most common reaction from people who’ve been teaching a while. In person is still my preference, but I think this has much more potential than Zoom and expect this to become much more common in the next three to five years.

What do you think? What are you curious about? What questions do you still have? Let me know in the comments below.