Future of Education for Virtual and Augmented Reality (FEVAR)
FEVAR is a special interest group that brings together students and faculty with a common interest in the potential for enhancing education and training through Virtual Reality and Augmented Reality (commonly called XR). The group connects participants with new opportunities, shares knowledge, and serves to create transdisciplinary partnerships in research.
- Join our mailing list: Stay informed about upcoming events by joining our mailing list! To sign up, email Ben Falandays at [email protected].
Co-Chairs:
- Dr. Mina C. Johnson-Glenberg
- Dr. J. Ben Falandays
Team members:
TBA
Upcoming Meetings:
Talk Series Fall 2025 Schedule:
Location: Zoom (https://asu.zoom.us/j/85020306938)
Wed., Oct. 22, 2-3 p.m.
- Presenter: Vipin Verma, Assistant Research Scientist, Learning Engineering Institute, Arizona State University
- Title: Designing A Virtual Reality-based Team Dynamics Training System for Enhancing Team Coordination
As work environments become increasingly complex and require ad hoc coordination, the ability of teams to coordinate under unplanned circumstances is critical in domains as diverse as defense, healthcare, and education. Adaptation to these environments will require teamwork and training to eHectively work within teams. To meet this challenge, an interactive system is needed that can monitor team interactions in realtime and provide individual and team performance data. We developed a team-based synthetic training experience in the Generalized Intelligent Framework for Tutoring (GIFT) to enhance team dynamics and coordination. The system can assess both the team's and individual team members' coordination skills and provide after-action training to support improvement. The system consists of an immersive virtual environment where three team members work through patient care and coordination challenges at a casualty collection point. Stealth data is collected during usage and provided to a Team Dynamics Measurement Framework (TDMF; Avancha et al., 2024) implemented within GIFT. GIFT utilizes TDMF algorithms to provide individualized after-action reviews based on both individual and team performance.
Tues., Dec. 2, 2-3 p.m.
- Presenter: Ronnie Videla Reyes, Researcher, Faculty of Education, Universidad Santo Tomás
- Title: Design with Embodied AI and XR: New Ways of Learning Mathematics Through Movement
This presentation examines how mathematics learning can be reimagined from the perspective of Embodied Design and 4E Cognition (embodied, situated, enactive, and extended) in mathematics education contexts. Rather than conceiving mathematical knowledge as abstract and disembodied, this approach emphasizes the role of bodily movement, sensorimotor coordination, and material interaction in the co-creation of mathematical meaning. The talk highlights design-based research in which students with special educational needs as well as those with typical development interact with XR and AI environments through an embodied approach to explore mathematical concepts using gestures, locomotion, and multimodal feedback. By situating movement as an ontological condition and design within an ergonomic epistemology, we argue that XR and AI technologies can broaden learners’ opportunities to generate, negotiate, and refine mathematical meanings. This framework opens possibilities for inclusive and creative pedagogies, in which learners shape mathematics through perception and action rather than by symbolically representing ideas. Ultimately, the synergy between Embodied Design, AI, and XR points toward a future in which mathematics education becomes more human-centered, participatory, and experientially grounded.
FEVAR Talk Series: Spring 2025
January 30, 2025
- Patrick Nalepka
Macquarie University
March 20, 2025
- Mina Johnson-Glenberg
Arizona State University
FEVAR Talk Series: Spring 2024
January 18, 2024
- Joshua Clingo
UC Merced
VR is often used to either control or manipulate perception but it has recently been implicated as a tool to acutely induce altered states akin to those in psychedelic, dissociative, and meditative practice. Joshua Clingo will discuss his work in exploring VR as a neuromodulatory tool to treat mental health disorders such as depression and anxiety, as well as its potential application in fostering creativity and attention in education.
February 8, 2024
- Two speakers: Ricardo Eiris and Heejin Jeong
Dr. Ricardo Eiris will discuss “Virtual Site Visits Using Web-Based Social Spaces”: Site visits/field trips have been used by educators to engage students in active learning, assist traditional lessons, and foster deeper student learning experiences. Nevertheless, site visits present major logistical and accessibility challenges that reduce the number of students who can have access. This talk introduces device agnostic (e.g., computers, mobile devices, head-mounted displays), web-based social spaces to deliver virtual site visits.
Dr. Heejin Jeong will discuss “Extended Reality in Occupational and Rehabilitation Training”: XR training systems play a crucial role in assisting individuals in acquiring new skills or regaining lost ones. This talk introduces several XR training projects employing intelligent systems featuring display-based AR and wearable biosensing technology. The aim is to assist occupational trainees and individuals undergoing physical and cognitive rehabilitation.
March 21, 2024
- Robb Lindgren
University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign
Dr. Robb Lindgren discusses recent work using XR technologies to facilitate collaboration in undergraduate astronomy classrooms. By selectively combining AR headsets with lower-tech platforms such as tablet computers, a shared representational space is created where students can communicate and share perspectives while engaging in problem-solving tasks.
April 18, 2024
- Julia Chatain
ETH Zurich (Swiss Federal Institute of Technology)
Dr. Julia Chatain explores the interplay between embodied learning, embodied interaction and avatar embodiment. Her work has significant implications for designing embodied learning activities in VR for mathematics in higher education. She also examines individual differences in learning and the sensemaking of abstract concepts.
FEVAR Talk Series: Spring 2023
Dr. Iulian Radu
XR Emerging Technologies in Education
Principal Research Scientist - Graduate School of Education, Harvard University
Presenting experiments and results of research using AR for STEM education.
Youtube (presentations and demos)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nfCsT74ixdE&list=PLUzehxsnh4fvsddz0mt6QTsiv-b7Rauc9
Website (all my projects) http://iulianr.com/
Dr. Peter Gerjets
Key Lab Members
Leibniz-Institut für Wissensmedien - Multimodal Interaction Lab
Univerity of Tübingen, Germany
http://www.iwm-tuebingen.de/p.gerjets
Dr. Robert LiKamWa
Director of Meteor Studio, ASU
School of Arts, Media and Engineering (AME) and School of Electrical, Computer and Energy Engineering (ECEE)
Presenting student-driven research and design projects in AR and VR, including production of new sensory affordances in smell and haptics, and explorations of new use cases in data-driven storytelling and sensemaking. https://meteor.ame.asu.edu/
Dr. Aurel Coza
Dr. Mina C. Johnson-Glenberg
Aurel - Director Center for Engagement Science at Ira Fulton School of Engineering.
Presenting on VR, biometrics and wearables.
ASU Center for Engagement Science
https://corporate.asu.edu/node/248
Mina – Director of the Embodied Games Lab in the Psychology Department.
Presenting on optimal design principles for educational VR and how biometrics can be used to further assess engagement and cognitive load.
https://psychology.asu.edu/research/labs/embodied-games-lab
Dr. Lila Bozgeyikli
University of Arizona's School of Information, and co-director of the Extended Reality and Games (XRG) Lab.
Presenting on lab research including:
Novel interaction methods to improve user experience in virtual and mixed reality
Increasing the sense of presence through real/virtual objects, and improving social presence in multiplayer VR through rendering HMD-wearing user's eyes on a headset
Leveraging VR for rehabilitation of veterans with traumatic brain injury https://ischool.arizona.edu/xrg-lab
Dr. Candace Walkington
Southern Methodist University
Associate Professor
Presenting on how AR allows learners to interact with dynamic holograms layered over real-world scenes, providing important opportunities for embodiment and collaboration. She will also present her research on designing and testing a multi-user AR environment for secondary school geometry where students collaboratively interact with 2D and 3D shapes.
https://www.smu.edu/simmons/About-Us/Directory/Teaching-Learning/Walkington
Dr. Steven K. Ayer
Karan Patil
Del E. Webb School of Construction
School of Sustainable Engineering and the Built Environment, ASU
Steve will present on recent construction content with XR in his lab. Karan will present on the design of, and some results from, a VR simulation he created to train in construction safety.
They invite FEVAR attendees to come to their center before or after the talk and experience their VR/haptic scenario; contact [email protected] for more info.