360° VR & Mobile VR

360° Virtual Reality (VR) is different from synthetic VR (virtual environments which are digitally designed), as it generally involves the viewing and/or interaction with an image or a video of a real-world environment taken at a 360° angle. The 360° image/video can then be experienced through most devices (e.g. desktop, mobile, tablet, Head-Mounted Display (HMD)). The choice of device will determine the level of interactivity and immersion the user is exposed to. Highly popular within this category are Mobile VR headsets like Google Cardboard and cheaper HMDs like the Oculus Go.

• University of Brighton’s Case Studies: School of Art, School of Media. and BSMS.

1. INTERACTION:

Pros:

• Compared to synthetic VR, 360° VR experiences and equipment are, respectively, easier to source/create and cheaper to buy, for both staff and students.
• For ‘in-house’ production, a simple approach is to use a 360° camera and editing software such as ThingLink or Adobe Premier.
• Students can collaborate on planning what content to create, participate in image capture, and plan how the content can be used, as well as engaging with the final 360° VR experience.

Cons:

• Compared to digitally designed Virtual Learning Environments (VLEs) (where anything can be possible), 360° videos/images often consist in the reproduction of real-world environments/situations, raising so limits to what can be created and/or externally sourced (e.g. copyrights constraints), and limits to the level of interactivity and immersion the experience can give.
• In 360° VR, the experience is more individual, quite static, not so mind-blowing or immersive and not as engaging.
• Educators run the risk of simply reproducing traditional methods of teaching within a virtual environment rather than inventing new collaborative ones.

2. INCLUSIVITY:

Pros:

• Compared to other immersive solutions, 360° VR hardware and software are both more accessible and more easily implementable within the already existing infrastructure (as no cables, trackers or additional computers are needed). Moreover, the low thresholds to create and modifying content ‘in-house’, can also make it more easily adaptable to the needs of individual students.
• 360° VR can add extra dimensions (e.g. interactivity and immersion) to already inclusive learning environments such as distance learning.
• Although not as immersive as Virtual Reality, 360° VR still allows students to ‘access’ environments otherwise impossible in the traditional educational setting because of cost, danger or distance (e.g. some labs, the North Pole, Mars, the deep of the ocean, war zones, etc.).
• 360° VR can help enhance a sense of empathy for the experiences of other people, encouraging so cohesion and mutual understanding within the group of students.

Cons:

• 360° VR mainly allows a visual type of experience. While the use of subtitles or pop-up boxes explaining tasks or things within the 360° environment can be added and be considered as steps towards inclusivity, haptic technologies that could allow the stimulation of other senses (e.g. touch and smell) and better support some student’s individual needs, are not yet an option.
• Educators can run the risk of using/creating 360° VLEs that are not necessarily suited for all student’s needs. The learning can be disrupted and the students can become disengaged, demotivated, less confident and excluded from the group or the activity being thought.

3. INNOVATION:

Pros:

• 360° VR, like any other immersive medium, offers the opportunity to revolutionize traditional modes of teaching and learning, apply and enhance powerful pedagogies such as ‘situated learning’ and ‘transfer’, and create more exciting and interactive learning activities that meet the requirements of 21st-century students (prospect and current).
• At the cheaper end of the scale, 360° VR technologies will likely benefit from rapid innovation and the quality of software and hardware will probably improve quickly over the next years too.

Cons:

• As the boundaries of what can be done with this technologies are yet to be written, while raising incredible opportunities to experiment with innovative pedagogies, it also raises significant challenges as case studies and clear guidance on how and when to effectively apply these media within teaching are still lacking. 
• As this is an emerging sector and technology keeps on evolving fast, any decision taken today is subject to uncertainty. For instance, 360° experiences, while financially more convenient, could risk becoming less favorable for students compared to other immersive media which will also become more accessible in the next years (e.g. VR, AR/MR, more interactive and immersive). It is therefore important not to rely only on 360° VR, as it is yet to be seen where it all will go and what our students will ultimately expect in the years to come.

4. INFORMED:

Pros:

• Knowing the technological and pedagogical affordances and limits of 360° VR compared to other immersive and non-immersive media can support educators to make informed choices regarding which tool/s to use, how, and when. Given the widespread adoption and accessibility of 360° VR within and outside the University, staff members should easily be able to stay up to date regarding this immersive medium while comparing it with the other devices also available across the institution (see: resources).
• As years go by, there will be an increasing number of case studies available to us, explaining how and when to effectively apply these media in education and which one/s to use in which context/s.

Cons:

• Staff needs to invest additional time in planning a series of learning activities based around these immersive experiences in order for students to benefit from the full learning opportunities presented.
• If 360° VR content is externally sourced, educators could face copyright constraints that could limit the number of options available to them, as well as risks to disrupt the students’ learning if the sourced and chosen VLE is not in line with the intended learning and teaching objectives.
• As this technology evolves, more and new ways of collecting personal user data consequently emerge, raising so new questions and concerns regarding how to deal and protect these new forms of data and who else could have access to it beyond the university.

5. INVESTMENT:

Pros:

• 360° VR is one of the cheapest immersive solutions available today, as its software and hardware are easily and cheaply externally sourced and/or created ‘in-house’.
• The 360° experiences can be viewed across a wide range of devices, from mobile phones, tablets, and desktops (generally already possessed by staff and students), or through cheap HMDs such as Google Cardboards and Oculus Gos.
• By 2025, it is expected that immersive technologies, more broadly, will become ubiquitous and populate the market, meaning that, by then, more students will likely to possess their own devices, reducing so the institution’s need to having to acquire them for all its students.

Cons:

• While the costs involved with buying, setting-up and maintaining 360° related software and hardware technologies may be relatively small, the opportunities for including more people in creating content and using the equipment will have implications for staff and student training and support (time and money investment).