Immersive technologies are pushing the boundaries of human limitations enabling new ways of receiving information, processing and communicating data. These technologies are being rapidly adopted by people of all ages and backgrounds who use them to socialize, to consume information, to make business and to have fun, among others. The field of education has not been immune to this disruptive process. Indeed, exploration of the technology and integration attempts with more consolidated but less immersive ICTs have been conducted. On one side, educators have explored representational fidelity and interactive capabilities of immersive technologies for deploying learning environments where learning activities are contextualized, experimentation and collaboration are promoted, and learners are motivated and engaged toward their learning tasks. On the other side, researchers have confirmed the usefulness of immersive technologies to deploy learning environments where is possible fulfill educational goals using modern pedagogical approaches and to reach desirable learning outcomes. Furthermore, some attempts to combine immersive technologies with real and digital worlds for educational purposes have also been held.
Despite the aforementioned research efforts, there are still no guidelines to design and develop learning activities that take advantage of singular capabilities of immersive technology for new trends in education. This special issue aims to attract original, pertinent and relevant contributions on innovative uses of immersive environments that take advantage of the unique characteristics of this technology for educational purposes.
|