Students Take a Roman Holiday with VR Apps

Students in Alicen Morley's history classes recently had opportunities to take unforgettable field trips to locations like the Palace of Versaille in Paris, France, the Parthenon in Greece, and the Colosseum in Rome. These trips were made possible by the power of virtual reality.

Ms. Morley's class is equipped with a set of Google Cardboard viewers -- headsets students can use for viewing and interacting with virtual reality environments on their smartphones. Through apps like Viewmaster (yes, the same company that made those classic red stereoscopic toys you played with as a kid!) and Google Expeditions, students are able to explore 360-degree 3D images and videos. The Viewmaster app provides self-guided tours for students, while the Google Expeditions app makes the experience collaborative by connecting a teacher tour guide to a class full of students.

Ms. Morley wanted her students to engage in an immersive experience with the places they read about and discussed in class. They learned about the ornate rococo style and excesses of the courts of Louis the XIV and Louis the XV of France, and then they got to see the palace firsthand with Google Expeditions. Other classes learned about government and religion in ancient Greece and then saw how those influences affected art and architecture when they visited the Parthenon through Viewmaster's Destinations app.

Once students were familiar with how Google Expeditions works, they were ready to become the tour guides themselves. Working in partners, students took turns leading an expedition to ancient Rome to point out significant landmarks and points of interest. Students learned to think critically about what they were seeing so that they could make inferences about what the structures could tell them about the society they were studying.

Google Expeditions has possibilities for applications in many different subjects. Students can visit underwater ocean habitats, travel to the moon, or even explore the human heart through virtual reality. It's exciting to think where Boone's students will head next!