Last week at their annual developers conference Google introduced a virtual reality tool for students and classrooms.
Named “Expeditions” this technology allows teachers to take students on immersive, virtual field-trips without them having to leave their schools.
Not only is this an innovative use of VR technology, it is brilliant marketing as every kid who experiences this is going to go home and say “Mom and Dad, we need to get this Google thing”.
Let’s take a look.
What it Is:
- A combination of software, hardware and a “viewer” including:
- An Android Tablet teachers will use to create and lead the virtual field trips
- A number of Android phones that the students will use in the viewer to experience the fieldtrip in VR
- A number of Google Cardboard viewers that hold the phones, kind of like a View-Master, but made of cardboard
What it Can Do:
- Watch this video from Google to see what this enables, pretty cool…
Why it’s Brilliant Marketing:
- If Google is able to deliver these kits at a low enough cost I could see widespread usage of these in schools
- For the majority of these students this will be their first experience with Virtual Reality
- You can only imagine the excited conversation at home after their first virtual field trip
- I’m sure Google will include plenty of “How You Can Do This at Home” collateral
Bottom line, this is a very cool use of technology and I can see this being an exciting way to augment the school experience. And much different than schools purchasing iPads, which in many ways were a solution looking for a problem, to me the direct benefit of this is pretty self-explanatory.
Well done Google, this is very cool.
clarkb... 