AR & VR

A pressing need for innovation in pedagogy has led educators to explore the use of emerging technologies in the classroom. One such technology is augmented reality (AR) – a powerful tool that is emerging into the spotlight due to its immersive possibilities and functional versatility. In this workshop, we will share our latest efforts to harness AR to enhance engineering education at HKUST. First, we will describe the development, implementation, and evaluation of our in-house AR application “AR Tunnel”, which is now used by around 100 undergraduate and postgraduate students every year to help prepare them for a wind tunnel laboratory project undertaken in courses on aerodynamics. We will then showcase the power of combining AR and gamification by introducing our ongoing project “Aerodynamics GO” and discussing the synergy that can be achieved by gamifying AR. Lastly, we will share our vision of what educational AR experiences might look like in the future, one in which new hardware capabilities will unlock unprecedented immersivity. This workshop aims to provide educators with insights into the current and future trends of AR, empowering them to reimagine education in their own contexts.

The CEI Idea Incubation Series is a platform for disseminating teaching innovations and showcasing emerging technologies and pedagogies for teaching and learning. In this series, we will showcase a variety of generative AI tools such as ChatGPT and Mid-Journey, which are applicable to diverse educational contexts. Additionally, we will introduce a specialized gamified teaching and learning course that CEI offers to all Graduate Teaching Assistants (GTAs). The series will also feature Virtual Reality teaching and learning simulators that we have developed to enhance pedagogical experiences.

Augmented Reality (AR) overlays the digital world over the physical world – thus ‘augmenting’ the real world experience. With AR, people can overlay digital content to objects, printed material or geographic locations, then use a smart device to scan for the digital content to appear. AR creates unique interactive experience for learners and can “bridge the learning gap between abstract descriptions and the real world phenomena,” (Luckin, Fraser: 2011) offering the potential to motivate both learners and teachers to re-think the way they engage in learning and teaching.