Short Deadline!

Don't you love short headlines? There is currently a competition running with $50,000 in prizes up for grabs for solving public safety challenges that affect millions of people. Interested? 

Introducing the Virtual Public Safety Test Environment Challenge. The competition offers a total prize of $50,000 USD for the design of a physical measurement environment that uses immersive virtual reality tools for testing new first responder technologies. 

Find out more and sign up to the Virtual Public Safety Test Environment Challenge. https://herox.com/NISTvr

- The submission deadline is May 3rd, 2017 so don’t dawdle! -

TEDx Shanghai

Ni hau, 

If you live or work in the Shanghai area, I will be presenting at TEDx Caohejing Park Salon on the "Great Virtual Reality Mystery Caper," a journey of curiosity and gumshoe sleuthing as we attempt to solve one of the biggest mysteries surrounding  virtual reality and your vision health. 

Just in case there is an opportunity to have coffee or shake hands with you while I am in Shanghai from May 16-22, I decided to post this. https://www.ted.com/tedx/events/22296

Chasing the Hype

At every conference I attend., I try to either interview or investigate what is currently happening with the big “3D players” of the past—some of the largest vendors selling to the education market four-five years ago, when the hype was at a high point. 

These days, these firms are not featuring 3D in their booths. Frankly, many of these sales people and manufacturers felt burned and betrayed by the educational market. They expected an avalanche of 3D sales and got only a dusting of 3D snow; they anticipated a gold rush of activity and only extracted a few nuggets. Their viewpoint, as expressed to me, was simple: if 3D doesn’t generate considerable volume in sales in the education market, they must move on to new and more attractive opportunities. These well-meaning manufacturers, integrators, and sales reps live for an avalanche mindset, delighting in the hopes of selling the “next big thing.”

Unfortunately, these folks fell for the trap illustrated in the well-travelled Gartner Hype Cycle.  They built their business sandcastles in the ebb tide of inflated expectations, only to lose their faith as the flood tides of disillusionment washed away their expectations.  The “next big thing” never panned out, at least in the realm of 3D in education. As VR now moves aggressively onto the world stage, will things turn out any different? See next week’s post for an answer.

Before and After (2)

The evidence of the informal action research (cited in last week's blog post) gives us some useful insight as to how 3D learning actually works in a classroom. Here are samples of before and after (before 3D visualization, and after) with Ms. Hillman's students:

Water cycle before

Water cycle after

Another before/after

Another water cycle after

The Lesson Learned.

Perhaps one fourth grader described it best: “you can picture it in your head better." Ms. Hillman beamed: “the visualization is so rich that it provides an experience unlike anything you can provide through teacher talk, or even hands-on investigation.” She added : “[3D simulation] takes students on virtual field trips to places they would otherwise never be able to go; the color, imagery, and the depth is attractive and captivating.”

Holli Hillman then asks the reader a clever rhetorical question: “The difference in visual understanding speaks for itself, right?” Right.