“Visualizing,
designing and making in 3D are our future.”
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Ed Tech Next Report
CoSN (the Consortium for School Networking)
has released their latest Ed Tech Next report “Dimensions in Learning: Visualizing, Designing, and Making in 3D.”
The report focuses on the growth and potential of 3D in education.
CoSN is a leading international
professional association for district technology leaders, representing
over 10 million students in school districts nationwide and is a powerful
and influential voice in K-12 education.
Once or twice a year, CoSN releases their
well-respected Ed Tech Next report. Ed Tech Next reports are periodic
publications which examine hot emerging technologies. Designed for busy
professionals, these reports provide quick snapshots of rapidly changing fields,
followed by succinct summaries of the issues as well as discussion questions or
case studies to guide organizational thinking. CoSN’s EdTechNext reports are
supported by a pantheon of companies: Amplify, BestBuy, CDW.G, Cisco, Comcast,
Dell, ENA, Filewave, Google, HP, iBoss Security, iDentityAutomation, Ipswitich,
itslearning, JAMF Software, Juniper Networks, Lenovo, Lightspeed Systems,
McGraw Hill, Microsoft, Pearson, Presidio, Promethean, Qualcomm, SchoolDude,
Sprint, and Verizon.
The report focuses on 3D in
education. (In bringing full disclosure to the table, I am one of the two
co-authors of this report. The other author is Chad Norman, who serves as the K-12
Highly Capable Program Director for the Mount Vernon School District in
Washington state.)
The report, as the title indicates, focuses
on the three “learning families” of 3D in education: designing in 3D, visualizing
in 3D, and making in 3D. Each of
these components is supported in some measure by the projector, large display,
and mobile display technology industry.
The report suggests that 3D technologies
sit at the bedrock of the coming digital learning revolution:
[The same] struggles and achievements mark the progress of
civilization. People observe, conceptualize and understand, laboring to think,
plan, design and solve and struggling to fix, build, tear down, retool,
reinvent—and do it all again. The digital revolution has not lessened our
ingrained desire to understand, interact with and challenge the immersive
world. In fact, these age-old strivings continue as we use new digital
environments to visualize, design and construct our way through life, learning
and work. Enter 3D technologies. 3D—originally a trademark of the artisan’s
stall, the architect’s bench, the gamer’s console, the blockbuster cinema or
the engineer’s display—is rapidly moving to the newest sandbox for learning,
hashtag, the digital classroom.
The report claims that 3D merits
consideration for its educational value proposition, not its “wow” factor. “In
other words, what matters is the potential for improved learning with 3D
technologies, not merely the pizzazz of 3D visualization, design or printed
objects.” The report then goes on to cite recent research indicating the
benefits of 3D technologies for visualizing, designing and making; numerous
industry players in the world of 3D in education; and a rich list of available
resources and references.
To obtain more information about this
report, or to explore CoSN membership, see http://www.cosn.org/ed-tech-next-reports
