Mixed Reality for Education (MRE) Implementation and Results in Online Classes for Engineering

Summary

In this work, a mixed reality system called MRE was developed to help students develop laboratory practices complementing online classes. An experiment was carried out with 30 students; 10 students did not use MRE, 10 used MRE, and 10 more used MRE with teacher feedback.

Abstract

The COVID-19 pandemic has changed many industries, empowering some sectors and causing many others to disappear. The education sector is not exempt from major changes; in some countries or cities, classes were taught 100% online for at least 1 year. However, some university careers need laboratory practices to complement learning, especially in engineering areas, and having only theoretical lessons online could affect their knowledge. For this reason, in this work, a mixed reality system called mixed reality for education (MRE) was developed to help students develop laboratory practices to complement online classes. An experiment was carried out with 30 students; 10 students did not use MRE, 10 used MRE, and 10 more used MRE with teacher feedback. With this, one can see the advantages of mixed reality in the education sector. The results show that using MRE helps to improve knowledge in engineering subjects; the students obtained qualifications with grades 10% to 20% better than those who did not use it. Above all, the results show the importance of feedback when using virtual reality systems.

Introduction

Technology has always been present in the education sector; profound changes have occurred in the devices used to teach classes. However, face-to-face classes remain the preferred option for students and teachers. When the pandemic came, it changed all sectors, and education was no exception. In 2018, before the pandemic, only 35% of students who studied a degree reported having taken at least one class online; that is, 65% of students completed their studies in person¹. As of April 2020, by government order (Mexican), all public and private schools were prohibited from teaching face-to-face classes; for this reason, 100% of the students had to....

Protocol

The protocol follows the guidelines of the Panamerican University ethics committee. The experiment was conducted with a total of 30 students, between 18 and 20 years old; eight students were female and 22 were male, and they all attended the Panamerican University in Guadalajara, Mexico (the second largest city in Mexico). All participants completed the informed consent process and provided written permission for photos to be taken and published during data collection. The only requirement was that the students needed to.......

Discussion

The MRE system allows different scenarios for students to learn about electronic components or physics topics. An important point is the possibility of the teacher providing feedback. In this way, the students can know what they did wrong and why. With the MRE system developed, an experiment was carried out with 30 students, where 10 students did not use MRE, 10 used MRE, and finally another 10 used MRE and received feedback from the teacher. At the end of the classes, a general knowledge test was given to all the studen.......

Materials

Name	Company	Catalog Number	Comments
MRE application for Andorid			The application was developed for the experiment, it was made by us. It is NOT public, and there are no plans for publication.
Non-slip fabric (20 x 20 cm)
Printing of our base image
Self-adhesive paper (1 letter size sheet)
Virtual Reality Glasses	Meta Quest 2		We use the Meta Quest 2, which is a virtual reality headset with two displays of 1832 x 1920 pixels per eye, with this headset you could play video games, or try simulators with a 360 view. Also, the headset has two controls, in which the virtual hands feel like your real ones and this is thanks to the hand-tracking technology. https://www.meta.com/quest/products/quest-2/tech-specs/#tech-specs
Wooden plate (20 x 20 cm)