The WELD-VR research project aims to develop teaching for welding and metallurgy in VR, to be used in the related teaching at University West. A single player VR application has been developed in Unreal Engine, and will be continually refined throughout 2022 until summer 2023.
OL07 Teaching Welding in multiuser VR
Background
Aim/goal/research question
Prototype and investigate how the addition of multiuser and a teacher co-present in VR can facilitate better teaching, e.g., by enabling more dynamic and adaptive interactions. In addition to development of the core multiuser functionality a key research question is to investigate which controls the teacher should have access to in VR to be efficient in such a situation, and how such controls should be designed to work well and give the teacher a sense of control and good access to features for guiding students.
Method
Prototype development, primarily based on an existing application in Unreal Engine.
Recommended past experience/interest
Unreal Engine, VR, game programming, multiplayer development.
Related Work
- Ke, F., Dai, Z., Pachman, M & Yuan, X. (2021) Exploring multiuser virtual teaching simulation as an alternative learning environment for student instructors. Instructional Science. DOI: 10.1007/s11251-021-09555-4.
- Rappa, NA, Yip, DKH & Baey, SC (2009) The Role of Teacher, Student and ICT in Enhancing Student Engagement in Multiuser Virtual Environments. British Journal of Educational Technology, vol. 40(1), pp. 61–69, Available: https://search-ebscohost-com.ezproxy.server.hv.se/login.aspx?direct=true&db=eric&AN=EJ822886&site=eds-live&scope=site.
Partners
This is part of the WELD-VR research project performed in collaboration between the departments “Economy and IT” and “Engineering Scíence”.
Resource limitations
The software development will partially be done using VR equipment shared with other student projects in Open Lab at University West. This means that access to equipment may be limited and need to be coordinated with the other involved students. Also, this means that the possibility of extending the time for doing the thesis work is constrained and the access to the device after June 10th cannot be guaranteed.