Primary school students’ experiences of immersive virtual reality use in the classroom

Abstract

The purpose of the present study was to examine primary school students’ learning experiences with immersive virtual reality (I-VR). Traditional education practices are failing to inspire new cohorts of young people who have grown up with digital culture based on active participation. Given this development, the pedagogic use of I-VR systems represents a promising way of fostering students’ learning engagement. This study involved engaging three groups of 10–12-year-old students with an I-VR system as part of an environmental studies project. Data were collected from the students before, during, and after the project via surveys that included structured and open-ended items. Through qualitative content analysis, we analysed the students’ experiences, comprehension of virtual reality, assessment of learning impact, and desire for educational I-VRs. In general, we aimed to contribute to more learner-driven development for the technology. The students’ experiences were primarily positive and revealed various actualised physical, cognitive, and emotional affordances. Their comprehension of virtual reality was influenced by the devices used, mental immersion, and aspects of the current project. Furthermore, I-VR was experienced as having influenced learning motivation, methods, and content. Finally, the students imagined various I-VRs for learning, most of which included time travel to imaginary spaces.

Keywords:

• educational technology
• primary school
• virtual reality
• immersive learning environments
• affordances
• virtual worlds

1. Introduction

This study examined primary school students’ experiences of learning within immersive virtual reality (I-VR) as part of an environmental studies project. Recent studies indicated that immersive interfaces, such as I-VR, have the capability to engage learners, i.e., incite interest by involving learners in meaningful activities, and help maintain their attention in the learning content and process (Christopoulos et al., 2018; Dalgarno & Lee, 2010; Ibáñez & Delgado-Kloos, 2018; Moro et al., 2017). A recent review revealed that using I-VR in education engages and motivates participants, enhances the learning experience, and improves participants’ achievement (Kurniawan et al., 2019). In spite of the recent and rapid development of I-VR technology, immersive learning (i.e., learning in which one loses the sense of time and physical place) with I-VRs is rarely implemented in primary school education. In this study we intended to investigate that halt in implementation by creating a research-practice partnership (Penuel & Gallagher, 2017) with primary school teachers who organised environmental studies projects in which they implemented I-VR.

The present article aimed to examine experiences of implementing I-VR in primary schools from the perspective of student participants. We studied the students’ experiences of using I-VR, learning experiences, comprehension of the I-VR concept, and desire for educational I-VR content. In this article, we pose the following research questions:

1. How did primary school students experience the applied immersive virtual reality system?

2. How did the primary school students perceive virtual reality as impacting their learning?

3. How did primary school students fathom virtual reality, and what would they use it for?

This article consists of six sections. We begin by introducing the theoretical background that explains the concept of I-VR and leads up to the proposed research questions. Then we describe the conditions of the study project and the research methodology. After which, we present the study results. Lastly, we conclude and discuss our findings, and make suggestions for future research.

2. Theoretical background

Virtual reality (VR) was defined broadly by Macpherson and Keppell (1998, p. 63) as “a produced state in a person’s mind that can, to varying degrees, occupy the person’s awareness in a way similar to that of real environments”. For them, VR devices were any devices that helped contribute to such shifts in awareness. However, other researchers have offered stricter definitions and set certain criteria for VR devices and immersive virtual environments (IVEs). Selwood et al. (2000) and Pan et al. (2006) expected I-VR devices and IVEs to be interactive in ways that lead to active participation and immersion in a computer-generated world. Furthermore, they emphasised that IVEs are three-dimensional and multi-sensory in nature. The interface between the user and the computer should “disappear” (Hedberg & Alexander, 1994, p. 215) to make the I-VR experience more embedded. Thus, I-VR can be defined as a combination of technologies that contribute to the temporary replacement of its user’s actual environment with a synthetical multi-sensory three-dimensional world, in which the user is expected to have an active and immersed role. Moreover, I-VR programs can be categorised based on the amount of user participation they allow; i.e., they can be passive, explorative, or interactive (Selwood et al., 2000).

In general, I-VR systems, consisting of integrated hardware and software, are said to have the following measurable features: system immersion (Cummings & Bailenson, 2016; Huang et al., 2010; Roussou et al., 1999; Salzman et al., 1999; Southgate & Smith, 2017; Tamaddon & Stiefs, 2017), multisensory cues (Salzman et al., 1999), interactivity (Dalgarno & Lee, 2010; Huang et al., 2010; Roussou et al., 1999; Southgate & Smith, 2017), and alternative frames of reference (Chen, 2009; Roussou et al., 1999; Salzman et al., 1999; Southgate & Smith, 2017). Together, these features may lead to a feeling of involvement and deep engagement known as “mental immersion” or “a sense of presence” (Dalgarno & Lee, 2010; Sherman & Craig, 2003; Slater et al., 1995). Successful mental immersion has been linked to the user’s imagination (Burdea & Coiffet, 2003) and suspension of disbelief (De de, 2009; Slater & Usoh, 1993).

2.1. Affordances of immersive virtual reality

Dalgarno and Lee (2010) argued that educational technologies do not cause learning on their own. Rather, they may afford certain learning-related activities, which may lead to the facilitation of learning. From the perspective of the theory of affordances (Gibson, 1986), I-VR fosters learning by providing a modifiable environment with affordances for diverse learning actions. Mehan (2017) argued that potential affordances, such as possibilities for physical, cognitive, emotional, or social activity in a virtual space, exist regardless of a person’s perceptions of them. Only after perceiving and engaging with an affordance does it become actualised. Consequently, it is essential to document both the potential affordances of an I-VR environment and the learners’ activities and experiences to determine whether the intended learning goals are met by the immersed learners. Regarding I-VR use and research, it is also important to note that, while the immersed learners’ perception and abilities to perceive and interact with the artificial I-VR environment are heightened, their abilities to perceive and interact with their actual physical surroundings are diminished.

Various affordances have previously been related to I-VR technology in general. According to Dede (2009), successful mental immersion in a digital environment may facilitate the following learning-related benefits: 1) utilising multiple perspectives can help better understand complex phenomenon, 2) participating in problem-solving communities and interacting with virtual entities of varied levels of skill can promote situated learning, and 3) taking part in realistic simulations can enable the successful transfer of knowledge and skills from the virtual to the physical world. In fact, Lane and Johnson (2008) suggested that IVE’s potential affordances included their capability to provide learners with “greater authenticity and clearer connections to real-world applications of skills” (p. 2). For Mikropoulos et al. (1997, as cited in Selwood et al., 2000, p. 234), however, the main potential affordance that separated I-VR technology from conventional pedagogical technologies was the chance to practice and explore phenomena and spaces that would otherwise be difficult to reach in the physical world.

We suspect, however, that the potential and actualised affordances vary depending on the I-VR system used. Furthermore, the actualised affordances are also dependent on the user’s skilled intentionality—the way in which they operate I-VR devices and perceive and interact with an I-VR environment’s virtual surroundings and situations (Rietveld et al., 2018). Steffen et al. (2019, p. 695–700) acknowledged the potential influence of the applied system on affordances and, instead, used physical reality as the baseline for comparison. They suggested that the domain-independent generalised affordances of I-VR are divided between four main categories; i.e., I-VR can be used to 1) diminish negative aspects of the physical world (e.g., reduce the physical risks involved in physical reality’s equivalent learning activities), 2) enhance positive aspects of the physical world (e.g., augment information and visualise abstract phenomena), 3) recreate prevailing aspects of the physical world (e.g., create virtual models that highlight certain aspect of reality), and 4) create aspects that do not exist in the physical world (e.g., creating fantasy worlds, providing supernatural capabilities, and changing the space-time relationship).

In this study, we were interested in the primary schools students’ experiences of I-VR use in the classroom. An examination of the participants’ experiences enabled us to analyse what affordances specific to this I-VR system were actualised during the project. Furthermore, we were intrigued by the learners’ perspective on what type of I-VR worlds for learning they would be interested in being immersed in and compared those results to students’ fantasies from nearly a quarter-century ago.

2.2. Immersive virtual reality in education

Recently, we have seen a rapid advancement in the capabilities and affordability of consumer-grade I-VR devices. However, I-VR has not become one of the digital technologies routinely applied in primary schools. Nevertheless, it has seen some use in secondary school and high school science classrooms as part of inquiry-based learning (Tilhou et al., 2020). According to a recent systematic review (Luo et al., 2021), the use of I-VR in inquiry-based learning has, however, declined noticeably. Although the investigators identified 27 out of 157 publications (17%) in which VR was applied in primary schools, most of the reviewed educational VR interventions were non-immersive in nature. Therefore, we set out to test how primary school students experienced immersive I-VR use at school. Because the technology was fairly new to them, we were more interested in their comprehensive learning experience than subject matter learning outcomes; what could this I-VR system be used for, what is it like for young children to use it, and how does its use at school make them feel.

Roussou and colleagues (2006) proposed that, when students use immersive interfaces, the type of activities conducted and guidance received are far more important for learning than the mere availability of an “interactive” virtual world. Similarly, Chua et al. (2019) found no significant difference in students’ performance when using interactive versus passive mobile VR. Although most of the students appeared to prefer the interactive version over the passive one, only slightly more than a half experienced the former as fostering “better learning”. When working with primary school students and immersive I-VR interfaces, Roussou and Slater (2017) discovered that interactions in a virtual environment do, in fact, afford opportunities for beneficial epistemic contradictions. Nonetheless, it was the social structure that formed in a guided I-VR experience, i.e., watching a robot perform a sequence of actions in I-VR that appeared to support the resolution of contradictions and enable young students’ reflection in and on action. Roussou and Slater (2017) claimed that “learning takes place when shifting from experience-physical acts to reflection-mental acts” (p. 243). They also concluded that I-VR systems with interactivity and guided activities have the potential to efficiently scaffold learners’ conceptual development.

Questionnaires and conceptual development tests have proven to be the most commonly applied data collection methods when studying I-VR interventions and learning outcomes (Luo et al., 2021). In this study, we were interested in primary school students’ perceptions of how I-VR had impacted their learning during the environmental studies project. By doing so, we wanted to ensure that the current questionnaires and tests do, in fact, consider all relevant aspects of enactive immersive learning experiences. Consequently, in this study, we discovered and discussed aspects of the learning experience that should be taken into account when studying and drawing conclusions about I-VR’s impact on students’ learning.

3. Materials and methods

The present study was carried out in the context of a smart and extended reality technology pilot project (2017–2018). It was organized by Innokas network, a national teacher network that aims to facilitate the experimental use of digital technology, in this case I-VR technologies in primary schools in Finland. The pilot project provided voluntary educators from across Finland with the necessary I-VR equipment. We meant to keep their implementation process and the learning experiences as authentic as possible. Thus, we decided to apply unobtrusive online surveys instead of clinical setups with focus groups and student interviews on site. This study relied on qualitative data gathered before, during, and after the project via online surveys. These surveys included both structured and open-ended items inquiring about the students’ experiences and thoughts on the applied I-VR system and learning tasks. We designed and delivered the pre-surveys via the University of Helsinki’s questionnaire service and the other surveys via Qualtrics (https://qualtrics.com).

3.1. Participants and the virtual reality system

Three teachers and 59 of their students (10–12 years old) from two Finnish elementary schools, one from an urban area and one from a rural area, voluntarily participated in this study (see Table 1). In total, 40 of the students (68%) were from the English-speaking urban school, and the remaining 19 (32%) were from the Finnish-speaking rural school. Eighteen students from the urban school were 6^th graders (30%), and all the rest of the participating students were 5^th graders (70%).

Table 1. Participants, project descriptions, and I-VR’s role

Area	Grade level (Mean age)	Student N	Goal of the project	I-VR role in the project	Length of the project
Urban	6th grade (12)	18	Explore and present countries from continents other than Europe.	Explore countries and find meaningful scenes.	3 months
Urban	5th grade (11)	22	Explore and present European countries and cities.	Travel virtually to a vacation destination and find a meaningful scene.	3 months
Rural	5th grade (11)	19	Explore and present European countries and cities.	Orienteer to a city and explore its sights.	3 months

Both the urban and rural school groups set out to learn about Europe or the world as part of their environmental studies. The commercially available I-VR system consisted of a Google Earth VR program (hereafter, the GEVR) and an HTC Vive device as supportive tools. The HTC Vive device includes a headset, which connects to a computer via cables. It has two base stations, which are used to track the movements of the user within a tracking area. The HTC Vive has two identical controllers, one for each hand. The controllers feature several buttons that result in different actions based on the program being used.

The GEVR’s virtual world is a projection of Earth, and the possibilities for exploration are much the same as the program’s desktop version. However, in the GEVR, the user may travel around the globe by holding down a button and directing their movement (also known as “flying”). Moreover, it is possible to use a sub-menu’s pre-set destinations and a miniature globe hologram for “long-distance teleportation” (see Figure 1). Additionally, the instructions within the GEVR are written in a way that encourages mental immersion into the surrounding Earth-projection (e.g., “fly faster”).

Figure 1. Screenshot of Google Earth VR’s globe hologram¹.

Seven students reported having previous experience using the GEVR program. Overall, 27 of 58 students (47%) reported having used either the GEVR, its desktop version, or both. Based on the students’ self-reported prior use of I-VR devices, we learned that ten students (18%) had never used I-VR anywhere before. Furthermore, 33 students (60%) had tried I-VR at an event, at home, at their friends’ houses, at school, or at a library, and 12 students (22%) used it weekly at home or at school. Three students’ answers were excluded, for they could not be reliably interpreted. These students’ previous answers led us to conclude they had misunderstood what VR referred to.

3.2. Research context

3.2.1. Urban school setting

During their environmental studies lessons, pairs of the 6th grade students gathered general information about a country of their own choosing and co-planned how they wanted to present their countries to others. Their teacher had handed out a project syllabus that contained a description of the goal, tasks, and expected topics to be covered in a presentation. Although the presentations offered an opportunity to utilize the students’ experiences in the I-VR environment, they were not instructed to do so.

The 6th grade students were instructed to venture around in the GEVR. They used it to explore their chosen countries and look for a meaningful scene. The scenes they discovered were later downloaded with a program called Street View Download 360 (https://www.softpedia.com/get/Maps-GPS/Street-View-Download-360.shtml). The students recorded audio explanations of their favorite scenes. Finally, the teacher assembled the scenes and the students’ audio recordings onto a self-made 360-degree world map (see Figure 2) in an online image-sharing platform called ThingLink (https://thinglink.com). At the end of the project, the 6th grade student group decided to conduct a virtual field trip and viewed those scenes with mobile VR goggles.

Figure 2. 6th graders’ virtual field trip platformThingLink in .

The urban 5th grade student pairs were assigned to plan a week-long trip to a European country of their own choosing. Each student pair drew an imaginary budget that they used in planning their trips. They planned everything from their means of transportation and accommodations to which sights they wanted to visit. When ready, they presented their trip plan and general information about their chosen country to others. Finally, the I-VR system was used to virtually travel to the locations and sights they had chosen for their trip. They too downloaded 360-degree scenes of meaningful locations they happened to encounter on their virtual trips. Their teacher assembled those scenes on a template 360-degree world map in ThingLink (see Figure 3). The 5th graders also visited each scene with mobile VR goggles at the end of the project.

Figure 3. 5th graders’ virtual field trip platform in ThingLink.

On average, an urban school student spent approximately 15–20 minutes in I-VR. Each week, the student pairs would use the I-VR system during their two environmental studies lessons, during daily “siestas”, and before or after school. The teacher was present for the student pairs’ first use, but after that, the students could use the system on their own if they wished.

3.2.2. Rural school setting

The rural school’s 5th grade students worked in small groups of three or four and were assigned a target country from Europe. Moreover, each small group member had their own target city within their country. Students were given handouts that consisted of questions and topics that their teacher expected the students to gather information about and present to their other classmates. The teachers intended to enable I-VR use for the student presentations, but the plan fell short due to technical difficulties.

Before visiting the separate cabinet in which the I-VR system was set up, small groups were asked to plan their visits to the GEVR by locating the main sights in their target cities. Each student used a tablet and the Google Earth program to prepare for their GEVR visit. Their task in the cabinet was to use the I-VR system to locate the target city in their country and visit its main sights. The teacher who assisted students in the cabinet made sure that each student’s individual I-VR-orienteering challenge began from a 360-degree “Street View” scene in front of their school. Only one student at a time could use the HTC Vive. The remainder of the small group students either followed the I-VR experience from a monitor or prepared for their own trips with a tablet.

The rural school’s I-VR system was set up in a separate cabinet, a smaller room along the hallway. This caused the tracking area to be smaller than what the device would have allowed for. The students could use the I-VR system for 10 minutes each. A few students left the I-VR earlier than that, but most of the students would have preferred to use it for longer. The rural school’s teachers reserved two hours for environmental studies lessons and I-VR use each Thursday for three to four weeks. One of the teachers was always present in the cabinet when the students used the I-VR system.

To sum up, the urban 6th graders used the I-VR system to find a personally meaningful scene and explore the world and their chosen countries from various perspectives. The urban 5th graders role-played tourists and used the I-VR system to take their self-planned trips to other countries. The rural 5th graders used the I-VR system to take part in an orienteering challenge with elements of sightseeing. These were the intended activities that students took part in with the studied I-VR system (see Table 1).

3.3. Collection and analysis of data

At the time of the data acquisition, this research did not meet the criteria to require ethical approval from the Finnish National Board on Research Integrity. Each student and their guardians signed informed consent forms before participating in the research. The teachers made sure that only those with consent participated.

The data acquisition was completed with surveys before, during, and after the project. The number of participants who answered each survey is depicted in Table 2. Before the participants began familiarizing themselves with the I-VR system, they were asked to fill out a background information survey. For background information, we used the students’ answers from the pre-survey regarding the following statements: “I have used the Google Earth VR application on a VR device” and “I have used the Google Earth application on some other device.” Furthermore, we utilized the students’ reported use of I-VR devices at different locations. The remainder of the data considered for this study consist of responses to open-ended questions.

Table 2. Data collection instruments and respondents

Instrument	Rural 5th grade (N)	Urban 5th grade (N)	Urban 6th grade (N)	Total (N)
Background information survey	18	22	18	58
Online questionnaire	15	22	18	55
Post-survey	17	21	15	53

During the project, the students would use a tablet computer to fill out an online questionnaire whenever they used the I-VR system. They answered questions regarding the I-VR experience. To allocate open-ended questions, the students were asked to rate the I-VR device for comfort and the GEVR program for user friendliness. They were asked to slide a bar underneath a smiley face with five options. Then, based on the students’ answers, they received targeted open-ended questions about the I-VR system’s usability, such as “What made the program easy to use?”, “What made the device uncomfortable to use?”, and “What did you enjoy the most about the I-VR device?”

After the project, the students filled out an open-ended post-survey. In the post-survey, they were asked to imagine having a conversation with a relative who neither had heard of their project nor knew anything about VR. They were asked to describe what VR meant and what they had used it for. Furthermore, they were asked, “If you could go into any virtual world that you can imagine and learn about anything at all, what would it be? And what would that world be like?” Furthermore, we conducted remote teacher interviews for a description of the I-VR implementation and project context.

Answers to all of the included open-ended questions were analysed by two researchers, who used qualitative content analysis to code and categorise the data (see Figure 4). We worked separately on the data, took turns extracting it, developed categories based on the data, and categorised the students’ answers. We also met several times to discuss our classification of answers and their categorisations. The qualitative content analysis resembled a loop (see Figure 4); it proceeded iteratively and involved repeated analytic cycles to answer each individual research question.

Figure 4. The applied qualitative content analysis loop.

4. Results

4.1. Primary school students’ experiences of virtual reality

The first research question addressed primary school students’ experiences of the applied I-VR system. The qualitative content analysis of the data yielded three main categories of interest (see Table 3). The largest of these, actualised affordances, was comprised of 175 mentions that described what was (or was not) possible with the I-VR system. The second largest main category consisted of 87 mentions of the usability of the I-VR system. The third main category included 81 statements with emotional expressions. Together, these categories represented the students’ experiences of I-VR technology use in the context of their environmental studies projects.

Table 3. Categorisation of students’ experiences (frequency of mentions)

Main category	Sub-categories	f	Positive	Negative
Actualized affordances	Virtual-physical	107	104	7
	Cognitive	37	37	0
	Emotional	31	28	3
TOTAL		175	165	10
Usability	Ease of use	43	42	1
	Simplicity	21	20	1
	Clarity	17	10	7
	Discomfort	6	-	6
TOTAL		87	72	15
Emotions	Awe	30	25	5
	Satisfaction	25	23	2
	Joy	18	17	1
	Excitement	8	7	1
TOTAL		81	72	9

4.1.1. Actualized affordances

According to the students’ experiences, the use of the present I-VR system afforded various possibilities for actions and activities (see Table 4). The featured categories were derived via a data-driven content analysis of the students’ experiences of the applied I-VR system. However, the main categories were inspired by and mostly congruent with Mehan’s (2017, p. 19) “Categories of Affordance”. Moreover, we were interested in the affordances within I-VR. Consequently, we replaced Mehan’s “physical/functional affordances” category with a “virtual-physical affordances” category, i.e., what virtual-physical transactions were afforded by the I-VR environment.

Table 4. The actualized affordances of the I-VR system

Main category	Sub- categories	Example	f	Positive	Negative
Virtual-physical	Observing	It was cool to see other cities and places. (R54)	44	42	2
	Exploring	It works best when you get to “explore places such as countries, mountains, and others”. (U618)	34	31	3
	Travelling	It works best for “travelling”. (U58)	20	18	2
	Flying	I enjoyed “flying” the most. (R516)	9	9	-
Cognitive	Immersion	I enjoyed when I was looking our house in the air. (U517)	33	33	-
	Projection	It works best for “learning about the world and what different places look like”. (U56)	4	4	-
Emotional	Autonomy	I enjoyed the most that you could go where you wanted to go. (U615)	31	28	3

Notes. Students’ answers are italicized. R5 for rural 5th grade, U5 for urban 5th grade, and U6 for urban 6th grade.

We divided the students’ expressions regarding the virtual-physical affordances into observing, exploring, travelling, and flying. The students felt that the I-VR system made it possible to view various places, explore the contents of the simulation, travel and move from one location to another, and fly around the globe. Four mentions, in the observing sub-category, highlighted the ability to view the world from various frames of reference. One of the features that enabled it was Google’s Street view -mode.

I enjoyed how many places I was able to look at from many different angles. (U616)

Nicest thing was to be able to look from street view! (U614)

It works best for “exploration of the world”. (R510)

The negative mentions regarding the virtual-physical affordances included difficulties in completing the learning task, meeting constraints that prevented the students from viewing something interesting, or having difficulty moving properly in the simulation. For instance, two of the students disliked not being able to use the Street view mode everywhere in the world:

It did not have so many street view places in Tanzania. (U62)

The cognitive affordances, i.e., “environmental cues that afford thinking and/or knowing about something” (see Mehan, 2017, p. 19), consisted of mentions regarding mental immersion (the sense of being in the virtual environment) and learning about the globe-projection. The students’ sense of presence in the I-VR environment was evident; i.e., they felt as though they had, in fact, gone to the actual places viewed in the GEVR. For instance, the students enjoyed visiting their homes and going to places that they had not previously visited. Four mentions dealt with learning about the globe, its countries, and different places from the projection of images from around the world within the GEVR.

I enjoyed “adventuring in Portugal, in realistic looking cities”. (R514)

I was able to go to visit Big Ben. (U511)

The emotional affordances, i.e., “environmental qualities that provide one with emotions” (see Mehan, 2017, p. 19), were comprised of expressions regarding the experience of autonomy. We included statements in which students described what they felt like within the I-VR environment. The students indicated having enjoyed the freedom of choice with the I-VR system; they felt in control, boundless, opportunistic, and capable:

I could control it by myself. (R55)

Three of these mentions were negative in nature because some students faced constraints and boundaries, such as not being able to go to the Sun in the GEVR (U617).

4.1.2. Usability

The usability of the I-VR system was mentioned in four ways, which we divided into four sub-categories: ease of use, simplicity, clarity, and discomfort (see Table 5). Altogether, the students felt that the I-VR system was simple and easy to use. Moreover, the guidance they received was also clear and simple and contributed to this ease of use. Then again, visual clarity was criticized, and some felt the system had caused discomfort.

Table 5. Students’ assessment of the I-VR system’s usability

Main category	Sub-categories	Example	f	Positive	Negative
Ease of use	Controllers	It was easy because of the easy controls. (U613)	14	13	1
	Guidance	It had a tutorial, and it made the use easy. (U618)	10	10	-
	General easiness	I liked it that it was easy to use and that it was fun. (U519)	9	9	-
	Functions	The search-feature was easy to use. (U68)	6	6	-
	Facility	It was easy to use because I have used HTC Vive before. (U69)	4	4	-
Simplicity	Device	The device was simple. (U520)	7	7	-
	Program	The operating system was not too complex. (R57)	7	6	1
	Controllers	There were no extra buttons. (U55)	5	5	-
	Guidance	In the beginning, it explained what each button does and when to use it. They were very simple instructions, so they were not hard to remember. (U66)	2	2	-
Clarity	Visibility	The visibility was a bit bad. (R53)	11	4	7
	Guidance	“Clear instructions” made the program easy to use. (U610)	6	6	-
Discomfort		When using the glasses, I started to feel sick, and I got a headache. (R514)	6	-	6

Notes. Students’ answers are italicized. R5 for rural 5^th, U5 for urban 5^th, and U6 for urban 6^th.

Ease of use was mentioned in a general sense, but some students credited it to the controllers, guidance, functions, or facility and prior experience. The simplicity of the I-VR system was associated with the device as a whole. The controllers specifically received praise for being simple. The GEVR was also perceived as simple by some, but one student had difficulties switching perspectives in the program. The instructions were mentioned as being good and simple.

Mentions of the visibility were mostly negative because the students felt that the head-mounted display was blurry or that the images were pixelated at times. However, the guidance was regarded as clear. Those students who mentioned having felt discomfort during or after I-VR use mentioned dizziness and headache.

4.1.3. Emotions

The online questionnaire yielded emotionally charged descriptions of the students’ I-VR experiences (see Table 6). The students’ used them to explain how they felt about I-VR use. They provided primarily positive remarks, but a few negative remarks appeared as well. The students felt in awe of how realistic their experience was, how beautiful the virtual worlds were, or how specific the visual fidelity was. However, some of the students were, in fact, disappointed by the program’s visual fidelity. Many positive mentions displayed an overall satisfaction with the use of the I-VR system in the project. However, again, a few students displayed discontent.

Table 6. Students’ positive and negative emotional experiences of I-VR

Example	Sub-categories	Positive	Negative	Opposites	Example
It felt almost the same as real life. (U612)	Awe	25	5	Disappointment	I did not like how “people looked strange”. (U67)
I liked everything. (U512)	Satisfaction	23	2	Discontent	I did not like how “it was difficult at first”. (R54)
It was a blast. (U518)	Joy	17	1	Boredom	It was boring and irritating. (U57)
It was very interesting to see virtual reality. (U54)	Excitement	7	1	Fright	It was scary, and at the beginning, it did not work. (U57)

Notes. We did not want to underestimate mentions of negative emotions. Thus, we specified them in this table. The table is read from the middle outwards to direct attention towards the ratio of positive and negative mentions. Students’ answers are italicized. R5 for rural 5^th, U5 for urban 5^th, and U6 for urban 6^th.

We divided the remainder of the emotional expressions into two sub-categories. ”Joy”, the first sub-category, included all of the mentions that described I-VR use as being fun, cool, or nice. However, one student thought it was boring and irritating when they used the I-VR system for the second time. ”Excitement”, the final sub-category, included mentions of the excitement, thrill, intrigue, and interestingness of various aspects of the I-VR experience. Again, one student stated that they became frightened before getting the program to work properly on their first attempt.

4.2. The I-VR system’s perceived impact on the students’ learning experience

The second research question addressed the students’ perceptions of the impact of I-VR activity on their learning. At the end of the project, when asked about the I-VR technology’s impact on learning, the students’ mentioned that it had influenced their motivation, the methods of learning, and the content that was learned. However, six students also mentioned that they did not think I-VR had an impact on their learning. Table 7 presents a summary of the I-VR system’s perceived impact on learning.

Table 7. The virtual reality system’s impact on learning

Main category	Sub-categories	Example	f
Motivation	Fun and novel	Learning was much more fun, and I learned more about I-VR things. (U67)	21
	Easy and comprehensive	Virtual reality impacted my learning so that it was not as difficult to study. (U53)	8
	Empowering	To me, virtual reality was like being freed from other schoolwork because it was so relaxing and fun, and afterwards, it felt good to continue learning. (U56)	5
TOTAL			34
Methods	Visualization	We got to look at amazing places in 3D, without actually going to that place. I think it helped a lot with choosing the country and places we wanted to show to our class in ThingLink. (U66)	17
	Immersed and boundless experiences	I could go to our topic country. (R515)	12
TOTAL			29
Content	Virtual reality	It affected, like, now, I know how to use I-VR glasses. (U521)	11
	Project’s topics	With virtual reality, I knew more about what the countries look like in real life. (U613)	11
TOTAL			22
No impact		Learning with the I-VR was a new experience, but it did not really affect me anyhow. (U65)	6

Notes. Students’ answers are italicized. R5 for rural 5^th, U5 for urban 5^th, and U6 for urban 6^th.

The students reported that the I-VR system had an impact on how learning felt. The students mentioned that learning with I-VR was fun and novel, easy and comprehensive, and empowering. The use of new I-VR technology in the school was a great deal of fun for the students. Some of the students reported that I-VR made learning easier because it helped illustrate and invigorate learning subjects. Furthermore, a few of the students highlighted that I-VR use had a positive, engaging effect on them.

Virtual reality made the learning really fun. I always liked when I got into the I-VR glasses. I had used them before, and I liked them too, so to see it in school is really fun. It was also fun to cruise around for a bit the first time I used the glasses. The views were amazing. If I have fun learning, I learn a lot more. (U617)

The students also experienced that the I-VR system impacted how they learned. It afforded new and useful means of visualization. The students liked that they could see new places around the globe and learn what those places looked like. Furthermore, it afforded immersive and boundless experiences. Students were able to visit three-dimensional places of their choosing and felt as if they were there.

It affected my learning by making it a lot easier. I think it is easier to understand what we are talking about if you can actually visualize the place. If we were looking at these places with normal pictures, I think it would have been a lot harder to understand. (U616)

Lastly, some of the students reported that the I-VR system had an impact on what they learned during the project. The students mentioned that, by using the I-VR system, they learned more about the technology and its use. Furthermore, some mentioned that the I-VR system gave them ideas, helped them learn about their countries of interest, and helped them pick out a meaningful scene, i.e., meet the intended learning objectives for the project. In addition, six mentions stated that the I-VR system had no apparent impact on learning. We thought that the following quote from one of the students summed up the I-VR-based learning experience for a majority of the students:

I am not sure how virtual reality affected my learning, but I am sure that it was a very different way of learning and I had a lot of fun being able to see my country like I was there myself. (U514)

4.3. Student’s perceptions of virtual reality and worlds

The third research question focused on examining how primary school students comprehended VR and what would they use it for. The analysed data were compiled from the students’ answers to the post-survey. The students were asked to define VR and describe a virtual world they would prefer to visit with I-VR technology.

4.3.1. Definition of virtual reality

We asked the students to explain what VR means to an unaware person in the post-survey. Their answers appeared to incorporate one or more of the following factors: device, mental immersion, the project’s learning task and the applied I-VR system, or a description of artificial reality (see Table 8).

Table 8. Primary school students’ definitions of virtual reality

Aspect	Example	f
Device	Virtual reality is a thing where you wear glasses and hand controls and you can see things in virtual life. (U510)	28
Mental immersion	Virtual reality is like a world where you can see places like you really were there. (U614)	18
Project	Virtual reality is reality made by humans. If you put on I-VR glasses, you can see and explore Earth from space or on the ground. (U52)	16
Artificial reality	It is not true reality. (R518)	7

Notes. Students’ answers are italicized. R5 for rural 5^th, U5 for urban 5^th, and U6 for urban 6^th.

Most of the students used technical descriptions of the device in their explanation. The I-VR glasses and controllers were the most popular aids for explanation. Some of the students explained VR in terms of mental immersion, although they did not use this concept by name. Their answers focused mostly on how VR can make a person feel as if they were in another place. This type of explanation was common among those students who had never used I-VR before this project, being reported by eight out of the ten first-timers, for example:

Virtual reality means that you can see everything as if you were there. (U513)

Additionally, quite a few of the students used the project’s learning task or the applied I-VR system to explain what VR is. Their answers either featured properties unique to the applied GEVR program or explained the technology through the learning task of seeking a meaningful location, such as:

It means that we can use it to go to different countries. (R519)

Lastly, some of the students simply stated that VR was artificial - or untrue reality, most of whom were from the rural school. Moreover, some of the students offered unique descriptions, such as the following:

For me, virtual reality means that you can live somewhere else than in your own home when you buy the glasses. They are very comfortable to use, especially at school. With them, you can live almost anything at all. (U54)

4.3.2. Students’ virtual worlds

The students’ showed interest in learning within and visiting various virtual worlds. They imagined utopias, historical worlds, outer space travel, nature and animals, various destinations in the physical world, and games. Furthermore, the students also imagined magical fantasy worlds, in some of which they would be capable of doing supernatural things. Interestingly, some of the students also imagined travelling to the future. We analysed these answers based on whether the students’ virtual worlds’ environment was an imaginary space or an emulation of a real-world space and whether a variation in time occurred or not (see Table 9).

Table 9. Themes and examples of students’ virtual worlds

Main theme	Sub-theme	Example	n
Space	Real	I would go to Maldives and learn about their culture and about what they eat. (U610)	29
	Imaginary	I would travel to Harry Potter magic realm and would want to learn how to cast spells. (U519)	22
Time	Alternative timeline	I would like to travel to a time where there would be all magical creatures, like unicorns. (R514)	22
	Present	I would like to go learn about other planets in our Solar system, like Saturn and Jupiter. (U52)	20
	Past	I would like to travel to a time when there were dinosaurs, and it would be in a forest. (U510)	5
	Future	That world would probably be in the future. It would be nice and comfortable like now, but technology will be everywhere. There would be futuristic gadgets and everything that I am interested in. There, learning would be even more fun than now. (U617)	4

Notes. Students’ answers are italicized. R5 for rural 5^th, U5 for urban 5^th, and U6 for urban 6^th.

A simple space and time analysis of the data revealed that the students’ most common type of virtual world was an imaginary space with an alteration of time (see Figure 5). By an “alteration of time”, we refer to virtual worlds that involve travel to the past, the future, or a completely alternative timeline. Among other answers, those with travel to the future were counted as travel to an imaginary space. Furthermore, worlds from games, books, movies, and other fantasy worlds belonged to this group, such as the following:

I would like to go to a magical world, and I would want fantasy. I want to learn spells and such. (R512)

Figure 5. Space and time analysis of fantasy virtual worlds.

Another popular type of student virtual world was an emulation of a real-world space in the present time. These worlds were typically either countries, cities, nature destinations, or outer space. Answers that did not depict an alteration in time belonged to the “present” sub-theme. It was typical for these to be emulations of some real-world space, for example:

My virtual world would be at the bottom of the water, and I would see and learn various fish species. I would know what they truly look like and how they behave. (U513)

Only two out of twenty answers with present time were considered imaginary spaces. Both of those students mentioned hoping to travel to their dreams. One of them wanted to realise their dreams:

I would like to travel to my dreams because it would feel like it is real, and I would get to do what I had dreamt about. (U515)

The other wanted to take control of their dreams while sleeping:

If I could go to any virtual world, I would go into my dreams if it was possible. It would be so that you would sleep in the glasses, and once you start dreaming, you could be in it, and later on, when you wake up, you could see what happened. (U65)

Finally, eleven students wanted to visit real environments with time alterations. This included answers in which the students were hoping to travel into some sort of utopian version of the world or a world in which anything would be possible, for example:

I would go to a world which was happy and where everyone would be happy. (U615)

Furthermore, all of the answers that described travelling to the past belonged to this category, for instance:

I would go to the Stone Age. I would like to learn how they lived then. All of the things there would be related to the Stone Age. (U520)

5. Discussion

In this study, we have examined primary school students’ comprehension of I-VR and experiences of its use in the classroom as part of environmental studies projects. Our first research question inquired about the experiences of the students with an I-VR system (HTC Vive & GEVR). Among the other findings, we managed to classify the specific actualized affordances of this particular I-VR system. Various activities afforded by different I-VR systems have been thoroughly documented by previous studies. However, it is the general and domain-independent affordances of I-VR (see Steffen et al., 2019) that offer the best available tool for the classification of different I-VR systems. In this project, the applied I-VR system recreated existing aspects of the physical world by emulating the globe in the GEVR. It enhanced positive aspects of the physical world by allowing the students to discover and travel around the globe in an efficient way, as well as by making the students feel more autonomous.

The specific actualized affordances of this I-VR system were divided into virtual-physical, cognitive, and emotional affordances. Additionally, we realised that the I-VR system did not afford any social affordances, i.e., possibilities for social interaction (see Mehan, 2017, p. 19). Evidently, the GEVR was not intended for multi-user I-VR activities. As such, the students were unable to work together within the IVE. From a learning perspective, this is a noticeable deficiency. In fact, Hedberg and Alexander (1994, p. 218) argued that one of the main factors that would support the transfer of knowledge and the educational use of I-VR would be to include collaboration with peers in the IVE. Because we learn mostly in relationship to our peers (Tenhovirta et al., 2021), it is important to orchestrate situations and design environments in which knowledge among peers can be circulated through participation in joint activities (see Lave & Wenger, 1991). Thus, when applying this particular I-VR system or any other similarly deficient learning technology, it appears important to make sure that the surrounding pedagogical arrangements would, in turn, support possibilities for social interaction around the technology (see Lehtinen et al., 1999).

The students offered many remarks regarding the various usability factors of the I-VR system. Those findings taught us that, despite their young age, students appeared to be able and eager users of the I-VR system. They found it simple and easy to use. This was not a surprise, however, because, by default, the GEVR is augmented with helpful messages and text. Furthermore, the students found the guidance clear and simple, contributing to the ease of use of the system. This sub-category included all answers that referred to either instructions or the tutorial. Without further elaboration, it was impossible to tell whether ”instructions” referred to the learning task, a teacher’s help, or the tutorial in GEVR. Therefore, not having conducted student interviews presented a limitation to the study. In the future, when studying the usability of a technology, it might be beneficial to consider interviewing as a method of inquiry to reveal such nuances. Lastly, some of the students felt discomfort when using the system. Furthermore, the clarity of the visuals (display and graphics) received mixed reviews. Fortunately, better I-VR technology has already been developed.

Additionally, the students’ experiences were embellished by emotions. As one would expect based on prior studies, these emotions were principally positive. The immersiveness of the technology left the children in awe. Moreover, their excitement and satisfaction with I-VR use were evident to the teachers and came up during the teacher interviews. It would be intriguing to study whether I-VR technology can sustain such positive emotions with prolonged use in the classroom. This should be studied further in the future.

Our second research question dealt with the students’ self-reported learning with I-VR. Often, I-VR’s effectiveness as a learning tool has been tied to its objectively measurable impact on learning outcomes in the studied subject (concepts, procedures, or affective skills). However, Hamilton and colleagues (2021) proposed that I-VR research could benefit from re-defining what learning outcomes are and how we measure them. By asking the students to describe how the I-VR system impacted their learning, we discovered that they thought it had an influence on their motivation to learn (how they felt about learning and studying) and taught them a new method of learning (how they learned and studied), in addition to the contents learned (what they learned about). In this study, the students approached learning with I-VR with great excitement; they found it fun, easy, and empowering. Furthermore, it offered illustrative visual support for their learning, as well as immersed and boundless experiences. Most notably, the tool itself was as much the subject of the students’ content learning as the projects’ topics were.

The purpose of the third research question was to elucidate the definition of VR from the primary school students’ perspective. The students used technical features of the device, the current project, and the applied I-VR system; the mental immersion it successfully provoked; and the distinction between true reality and VR to help define the concept for an unaware person. Then again, the students’ virtual worlds appeared to reflect their personal learning interests and fantasy-driven imaginations but also reflected some of the most abiding popular culture objects (e.g., Harry Potter and Fortnite) in Finland at that time. Much like in Bricken and Byrne’s (1993) study, one or more students in this study imagined utopias, historical worlds, outer space, water worlds, real-life destinations, and games. The only noteworthy differences were the appearance of fantasy worlds, supernatural capabilities, and time travel to the future in the current study’s students’ answers. Based on the students’ answers, they seemed to hope for experiences that do not exist or are difficult to attain in the physical world (see also Steffen et al., 2019, p. 699).

To sum up, different I-VR systems have unique combinations of affordances. Sometimes, I-VR systems lack affordances for well-rounded learning experiences, such as possibilities for social interaction and cooperation. Thus, it would be wise to categorise educational I-VR systems based on what sort of user participation and activities they can potentially afford. As we mentioned in sub-section 2.1, I-VR programs can be categorised as passive, explorative, or interactive based on the amount of user participation they allow (Selwood et al., 2000). However, the quality of that participation should not be overlooked. The overt learning actions of an I-VR system can be passive, active, constructive, or interactive (Chi, 2009). Our suggestion for research and developers is to apply joint labels, such as “explorative-constructive” and “passive-active”, to I-VR programs to inform others about what affordances to expect from the software. Such labels would at least indicate how much a learner can participate and in what way. Moreover, it appeared that learning occurred mostly surrounding the use of the I-VR system in the virtual field trip projects. The GEVR is an explorative-active program, without any built-in pedagogical structure. Pedagogical experts should work together with I-VR content designers (see also Fowler, 2015) because it is not merely the availability of the technology that matters but also the sort of available activities and guidance experienced within it (Roussou & Slater, 2017; Roussou et al., 2006). These factors could help teachers find suitable I-VR systems for teaching and, if need be, design around I-VR, i.e., complement I-VR experiences with other pedagogical arrangements.

We recommend developing learning experience outcome measurement tools or add-ons for technology-mediated processes to capture learning-related effects beyond the intended cognitive, procedural, and affective skills measures. This study showed that immersive learning can lead to experiencing novel learning methods, and it may motivate students even beyond the subject or project at hand. Furthermore, this study suggested that, when the learning medium, here the applied I-VR system, is rather novel, students may learn about the medium itself, along with other content. Therefore, qualitative self-assessment outcomes should be considered, in addition to the existing quantitative objective measurement tools when assessing immersive learning technologies’ impact on learning.

By asking the students to explain the concept of VR and imagine the virtual worlds they would prefer to visit, we developed an illustrative definition of the current I-VR technology suitable for young children: it is a technology with goggles and controllers that enables its user to travel between two realities. This resembles the portal fantasy literature genre, in which there is a route between the known reality and the fantasy world, which both exist simultaneously. Thus, great metaphors for I-VR for primary school children, in this day and age, could be, for instance, Platform 9¾ in Harry Potter, the rabbit hole in Alice in Wonderland, or the Wardrobe in Narnia.

6. Conclusion

We have applied the method of qualitative content analysis to study primary school students’ experiences of I-VR use as part of environmental studies projects. While there is evidence in prior research that I-VR can offer an engaging and motivating medium, something seems to delay its implementation into primary schools. In this paper we focused on the students' perspective. We collected the analysed data via online surveys that students filled out after their I-VR experiences and after the conclusion of their projects. Our limited data consisted of mentions in various open ended questions by 41 5^th graders from two different schools and 18 6^th graders.

Overall, we received a large number of positive remarks about the usability of the system. The students displayed primarily positive emotions through their answers. By applying the I-VR system, they learned about the concept and use of I-VR technology. At the end of the project, many of the students displayed ability to imagine various learning related virtual worlds. Furthermore, a few instances of discomfort and some low opinions of the visual clarity should not present an obstacle for the technology’s implementation. However, if the discovered lack of social affordances of the applied I-VR system is a wider phenomenon in I-VR use and design, educators and institutions might be doubtful to invest in it. Overall, we suggest that the current halt in implementation ought to be studied further also from the teachers’, educational institutions’, and content developers’ perspectives.

Our purpose was to contribute to more learner-driven development for I-VR technology. We hope that our methods will spark interest in the learners’ thoughts about and desire for I-VR-mediated learning activities. We also hope that our research findings, recommended reforms in learning outcome instruments, and proposed use of joint-labels for I-VR systems will influence and inspire the development, use, and study of new educational I-VR content.

Acknowledgments

This research was supported by Innokas network (www.innokas.fi), Business Finland (Co-innovation project AI in Learning), Academy of Finland [grant number 331763], and the Strategic Research Council [grant numbers 312527 and 336064] of the Academy of Finland (Growing Mind, see www.growingmind.fi). Furthermore, the authors wish to extend a thank you to the participating Innokas Network teachers and students.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Declaration of interest statement

The authors report there are no competing interests to declare.

Additional information

Funding

The work was supported by the Academy of Finland [331763]; Business Finland; Strategic Research Council of the Academy of Finland [312527, 336064].

Notes on contributors

Joakim Laine

Joakim Laine, M.Ed., is a doctoral student in the doctoral programme in school, education, society and culture (SEDUCE), University of Helsinki. For several years now, Laine has worked alongside teachers, coordinators, and project managers of Innokas network (www.innokas.fi/en) in various design-based - and research-practice partnership projects. Laine’s research interests lie in facilitation of learning, immersive interfaces, and imagination. https://orcid.org/0000-0002-3407-6551

Tiina Korhonen

Tiina Korhonen, is the University Lecturer (Learning Innovations in Digital Society) and head of Innokas Network (www.innokas.fi/en), coordinating nationwide Innovation Education activities for over 700 schools in Finland. Dr. Korhonen’s professional interests lie in the wide landscape of 21st century learning and development of school practice in the context of the digital society, with special focus on the practical opportunities available through digital tools and processes, including digital learning environments, computational thinking, and robotics. Through her national and international collaborative networks she develops and shares innovative school practices in learning, professional teaching and in school leadership and school partnerships. https://orcid.org/0000-0003-2875-4915

Kai Hakkarainen

Kai Hakkarainen, is Professor of education in the Department of Education, University of Helsinki. With his colleagues, Hakkarainen has, for 20 years, carried out learning research based on psychology and cognitive science at all levels, from elementary to higher education. During recent years, Hakkarainen’s research activity has expanded toward investigating personal and collective learning processes taking place in communities and networks of experts, including knowledge-intensive professional organizations and academic research communities. https://orcid.org/0000-0003-3507-7537

Notes

1. Imagery ©2016 Google, CNES/Airbus, DigitalGlobe, Landsat/Copernicus.