Google’s Android Phone Leads the Way: Augmented Reality

Thursday, August 20th 2009 by Kaya Hardin

“The future has already arrived. It’s just not evenly distributed yet.”
-William Gibson

While for many the idea of using Skype in the classroom to enhance instruction still seems far off in some science fiction author’s vision of the future, others are already using it and what’s more, they realize that it’s only the tip of the coming wave in ed tech advances.

Skype creates a bridge between classrooms, fostering ideas through its immediate application, but augmented realities will build bridges between you, your students, and the world around you.

Wikipedia defines augmented reality as “a field of computer research which deals with the combination of real-world and computer-generated data (virtual reality), where computer graphics objects are blended into real footage in real time.” This technology, while still in its infancy, has as many educational applications as there are minds to dream them up.

“Advancements in mobile phone technology have cleared the way for a coming wave of “augmented reality” applications that merge the physical world with information compiled about people and places on the Internet,” writes John D. Sutter for CNN.com. In his article he points out the variety of existing applications, ones that are still in sandbox mode, and others that are just being conceptualized.

As examples, Sutter mentions Wikitude, an app that provides information on landmarks; Total Immersion, which turns baseball cards in 3-D images; and Layer, a mobile browser that allows people to see information blurbs on the local landscape. (Check out the videos below for examples.) Another version of augmented reality tech that I’ve read about uses glasses to display the data, instead of phones. Less unwieldy, but further away in terms of availability. These applications are the few and the early – and are, of course, limited by the scope of the hardware that runs them. While I admit to being one of the impatient types – raised on the heady visions of Robert Heinlein, William Gibson, and Arthur C. Clarke – my excitement over the potential uses of this technology makes the wait worthwhile.

What does this mean for education? I can imagine field trips where students lift their phones to view a monument’s history, age, and relevance. A classroom with students answering questions by direct message twittering – the answer silently hanging above their heads, viewable to the teacher only. For a moment, let’s forget that many school can’t afford the computers that are needed to run Skype let alone the Android phones that will access this new, augmented reality. How can you see educators using it for an interactive and engaging learning environment?

I have images inspired by William Gibson’s novels floating though my mind – visions of a world that allows everyone to access humanity’s infinite wealth of information from anywhere, at anytime.

“Why shouldn’t we give our teachers a license to obtain software, all software, any software, for nothing? Does anyone demand a licensing fee, each time a child is taught the alphabet?” -William Gibson