Report from the Augmented Reality teacher training workshop

Codereality has successfully organized an Augmented Reality teacher training workshop. On October 7-9, 2019 we organized a three-days event for teachers hosted by Oxford Brooked University. The workshop aimed to support teachers’ technical, digital and pedagogical competences necessary for delivering courses on the topic of Augmented Reality to undergraduate and graduate students across Europe.

The workshop was attended by 20 teachers, researchers, developers and students representing several universities, companies and projects interested delivering training on the topic of Augmented Reality.

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We started the workshop by introducing Code Reality, our Augmented Reality course and the methodology we employed for designing it. We shared our experience of piloting the course – 12 weeks of teaching action, design thinking and agile, and project supervision.

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We then proceeded with a hands-on workshop “AR app 101” to both demonstrate how Code Reality tutorials are designed and give the participants a chance to experience the tutorial itself directly.

AR app 101 is one of our basics tutorials aiming to teach how to build the first Hololens / ARkit / ARcore app! We demonstrated the full workflow from illustration, target creation, 3D modelling to AR experience on Hololens or other AR device that can be created in 15mins and be taught over an hour.

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On the second day we proceeded with the Code Reality Unit Summaries – short presentations by the instructors who delivered the Augmented Reality lectures and workshops when they were taught as a block intensive training course in February 2019 (Course Module Augmented reality).

We presented the selected 9 lectures and 9 tutorials, including the main content of the units, learning objectives, intended learning outcomes, resources, practical exercises, assessment recommendations and our lessons learnt:

  • Lecture: Introduction to AR, Dr Fridolin Wild
  • Lecture: HCl methodologies, Alla Vovk
  • Lecture: Perception, Alla Vovk
  • Tutorial: Modelling AR UI/UX, Alla Vovk
  • Lecture: Software Engineering, PD Dr Ralf Klamma
  • Tutorial: New Business Development, PD Dr Ralf Klamma
  • Lecture: Technology Overview, Dr Fridolin Wild
  • Tutorial: Markers, Jazz Rasool
  • Lecture: Geometric Algebra, Dr Carlos Fresnada Portillo
  • Lecture: Story Telling with AR, Carl Smith and Jim Hensman
  • Tutorial: 3D modelling, Mark Ransley
  • Tutorial: Gesture interaction, Will Guest
  • Tutorial: Gaze interaction, Joshua Secretan
  • Tutorial: Voice interaction, Joshua Secretan
  • Tutorial: Spatial Understanding, Will Guest
  • Tutorial: 3D scan and animation, Yu Huang
  • Lecture: Careers in AR, Joanna Jesionkowska
  • Lecture: Research Directions, Carl Smith and Dr Fridolin Wild
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In the afternoon of the second day, we started with the presentation of the results of the Core Reality Skills Survey we conducted in 2018 that evaluated the skills required from the Augmented Reality developers on the job market. We also engaged the participants in brainstorming and discussion of the AR skills that they consider essential. This resulted in a diverse set of skills from programming to creativity and project management.

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We concluded day 2 with a panel discussion on the Augmented Reality curriculum. Several participants of the workshop shared their experience teaching Augmented Reality in different study programs and oganizations. The topics of the discussion included:

  • What should be taught? (Open Space discussion about the core curriculum)
  • Can AR be a programme on its own? or is it inside HCI? CS?
  • What are basic and advanced AR?
  • Should AR be interdisciplinary with media & CS? Can it satisfy both?
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During the final day of the workshop, two important sessions were organized. We started with sharing the practical considerations for teaching the topic of Augmented reality. The following issues were presented and discussed:

  • Software installation for a CIP pool
  • Hardware maintenance and repair
  • Managing equipment and accounts
  • BYOD AR
  • Project work/homework challenge: equipment available only in the lab
  • Network (Wifi) requirements and protected networks
  • Using git for student collaborative projects
  • Evaluation of student projects and storing/reusing the code
  • Content creation challenge (Libraries of free 3D content vs. creating own content)
  • Copyright issues (Safe and ethical use of AR and AR content)
  • Computer Science vs media challenge (both are often required for a successful AR project)
  • AR lab in teaching (Researchers, R&D projects, equipment, resources, customers, processes, etc.)
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The workshop concluded with an overview of the Augmented Reality open textbook. We presented this community initiative stared by Code Reality, demonstrated some of the chapters of the book, and gave instuctions on how to contribute. The participants were able to install the necessary book tools in an install party.

The goal of the AR open book is to create the first comprehensive Open Educational Resource as a foundation for AR curricula in Higher Education.

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The teacher training workshop was organized by a team from five European universities withing the AR-FOR-EU project.