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Investing in the Well-Being of Educators, with James McCrary
“Pivoting” isn’t just an industry term anymore - in the wake of COVID-19, educators have had to pivot as well, quickly adopting XR collaboration and video conferencing technologies just to teach their students. Educational consultant and innovation director James McCrary explains how his most important work lately is just making sure teachers and parents are adjusting to the new norm.
Julie: Ok. Hello, my name is
Julie Smithson, and I am your XR for Learning podcast host. I look
forward to bringing you insight into changing the way that we learn
and teach, using XR technologies to explore, enhance, and
individualize learning for everyone. Today, my guest, James McCrary,
is an educator located in Baton Rouge, Louisiana. And since 2012, he
began presenting at state, regional, and national conferences such as
LAC-- what--
James: Yeah, that's LACU.
Julie: LACU! And FETC and CUE
and ISTE, on topics around 3D and immersion technology. He is a
co-founder of Singularity Media Group, which specializes in spatial
awareness, and learning in augmented and virtual reality. He also
hosts the VR podcast in Simulation Live, discussing the impact of
immersion technology. In 2019, he was recognized as an Apple
Distinguished Educator and Google Certified Educator for his work
integrating immersion technology into the classroom and positively
impacting students globally. Recently, he began partnering with LSU
College of Education, Faculty and Research on virtual reality with
pre-service educators, and as the incoming president of ISTE Virtual
Environments. Thanks so much for joining me, James.
James: Oh yeah. Thank you so
much for having me. I mean, I love talking about this stuff. And so I
think podcasting just lends itself to me just kind of rambling on a
little bit, so... [chuckles]
Julie: [laughs] Amazing. Well,
there's so many things to talk about in education today. And I know
I'd love for you to share with our listeners a little bit about what
you do on a daily basis, and how you're making the biggest impact as
your role of director of technology and working with schools in
Louisiana to introduce immersive technologies.
James: Primarily, right now my
direct role is I am a director technology at -- essentially -- an
elementary school through fifth grade. And the thing that we focused
on the most right now is a augmented reality, both in terms of
consumption and creation. And I work with other schools in the area.
I'm very fortunate to have really good relationships with a lot of
other directors of technology, not just in our area, but in our
surrounding extended metro area, in our state, even in surrounding
states. And I've been kind of adopted [chuckles] by other
organizations in Florida and California that have graciously allowed
me to interact with their schools, their students, and their teachers
to kind of go beyond just AR and looking at other type of spatial
learning, using things like head mounted display, VR experiences,
both in terms of consumption and also creation and collaboration. And
so on a daily basis, throughout the day, I'm working with teachers
and students, obviously with their technology needs, but also
integrating the AR methodologies, primarily using things like
CoSpaces and Merge EDU -- that's two of the biggest ones that we use
-- but also in the evenings, and on weekends, and times that I take
off with other schools to implement those other levels of technology
that we just talked about.
Julie: That's great. I have to
ask, how has that role changed for you since Covid has changed the
way that students learn? You know, implementing that into schools is
obviously a challenge *without* having a pandemic being a part of the
solution.
James: It's-- [chuckles] Well,
I'll tell you, my sleeping schedule is very bizarre. It is not
normal. But it has been interesting. I like to consider myself a
techie. I love technology. And it's obviously what brought me out of
the classroom and into this role of technology and being able to lead
people in that. But I will tell you that even with kind of seeing
some of this coming, just paying attention to what was happening in
China, I don't think that I was physically and emotionally prepared
for what was going to come, when our governor had closing schools and
issuing the stay at home. Which -- on the record -- I'm 100 percent
behind, I think it's necessary. But I have found myself doing remote
work that I felt that I'd actually enjoy greatly. But it is a little
taxing if you're not used to it and it's a little bit of a change
from going to a physical place. And so a lot of my time for the first
two or three weeks was just making sure that our-- that all of our
teachers and administrators were okay with what we were doing. That
they feel comfortable communicating with their students, with their
parents, and then spending a lot of time during that -- and even
after that and continuing still -- talking to our parents. Are they
comfortable? Because thinking about elementary school, it's-- you're
communicating a lot more with the parents and making sure that
they're OK. Because they're staying at home, they're working, but
they also have children that they're now becoming the de facto
educator in their child's life. And you're trying to make sure that
they're mentally OK, and that they're not overwhelmed with the things
that are being sent out to them, and just trying to be mindful. So I
think the biggest shift for me during this whole process has been
less about the technology, and more about developing relationships
through distance, which has been an interesting concept to grasp.
It's more psychological in nature. So that's really been the biggest
shift that I've seen.
Julie: That's so interesting,
how something like this can shift your whole role -- essentially --
to such an important-- part of the puzzle is that mental well-being.
I have lots of conversations about the biggest investment in
education right now we need to give is the investment of well-being
for our teachers, and making sure that their knowledge transfer can
be brought to a remote presence for these children who are learning
from home. And their role continues to hold its value. And also they
transition into the demand and need that the kids are now asking of
them, as well as the parents asking of them. And then on top of that,
these teachers have their own families at home, some of them with
toddlers running at their feet.
James: Yes. [laughs]
Julie: It's an unbelievable
situation when you start to tell the story about that. So good for
you for supporting teachers that way. And I hope that is something
that's continued through every community and region and education
system globally, to recognize teachers in that sense too, making sure
they're OK. And then on top of that, making sure parents are OK.
Everybody's affected by this pandemic -- in one way or another -- in
so many different ways. And right now the ability to transfer those
lessons into a remote learning package that works for everybody
functionally is an overwhelming thought.
James: We've talked before about
that word, "pivot". It's not just for industry anymore. It
is for education. There's a lot of pivoting happening. And that word
you use -- "functionality" -- is the big component. I think
the functionality of how we're doing distance learning -- whether
it's online, whether it's analog or whatever the case may be -- you
have to be really quick on feedback on being able to pivot what
you're doing as an educator, as a leader, as a parent, as a student,
to making sure that all the parties involved are growing in terms of
not just academics, but also in relationship or most importantly,
foundationally, emotionally.
Julie: So that leads to a really
important part of what you do is immersive education, both in the
storytelling and understanding the power of being spatially present.
Last year I wrote an article, actually, and it was about "it's
time to teach in an voxels instead of pixels" and engaging into
three-dimensional learning, that we live in a three-dimensional
world, why are we not teaching it? Obviously, there's a lot of people
who have us that way. And this is the introduction to spatial
learning. And now that we're being moved into this remote presence of
learning from home -- or working from home -- being spatially present
and having that engagement and understanding the humanics behind it.
And I use that term, it's a brand new one that I'm trying to
socialize, because it's the engagement of having the ability to speak
freely, just as you and I are having this conversation. But then also
understanding the data analytics behind us and the technologies that
are taking place that immerse us into this experience. So how do we
build humanics into our spatial presence, and be engaged in these
immersive experiences to get the most out of what they're intended to
do?
James: The interesting thing--
and I love that word. I don't think I've actually heard it. And when
you said it, it resonated with me. As soon as you said it, I knew
exactly what it meant. I'm not sure if it's a real word.
Julie: Actually, it's funny. If
you look it up, if you type it into a Google doc, it will spell
"humanics" wrong, which is so ironic. You'll have to try
that, because spell check won't even accept humanics, which is almost
like-- it's the rebuttal of the robot ecosystem, they're saying, "No,
they can't learn that word!" [laughs]
James: I would tell spellcheck
the same thing that Thor said, which is "all words are made up."
OK?
Julie: [laughs]
James: So just go with that. But
I think that it really is an interesting thing to think about. Dr.
Jeremy Bailenson -- who have just immense respect for -- he has been
talking about this video conferencing fatigue that we have. And it's
not something that's just that he's talking about, a lot of people
are talking about. And that's kind of like our stepping stone into
trying to have the spatial presence is, "Oh, I'm going to go
beyond just a phone conversation. I'm going to have video." The
problem is we are face to face with each other, almost video
conferencing things in a very unnatural way for extended periods of
time. I mean, we're not all like people in a newscast, where that's
just the norm, where cameras are our faces and we're seeing people up
close and we're having to kind of engage. And he has a solution that
he mentions on that. But it really got me thinking in terms of what
spatial presence is and what spatial learning looks like. And it's
multifaceted. But one of the components that I think about, we think
about collaboration is OK, you have Zoom, you have Google Meets, then
you have Teams, you have things like that. How can you take that to
the next level, where you can create that natural distance that you
have, like when we're having conversations face to face where you can
look away, you can pull away, or whatever. And that would be
something like Engage, which I love Engage. I think Engage is one of
the best platforms for VR that allows me to go in, and I can walk
up-- if Julie's in Engage and I'm in Engage, I can walk up and have a
conversation with you. But so-and-so is over there, and I'm going to
go, I'm walk over and talk to them. Or if I want to pull away from
the conversation, I will. I'll go and I'll sit somewhere else. And
all the while I can still engage as much as I want, but I can also
pull back from that. And that's just a little snippet of what does
spatial really mean, and what does it add to the conversation? And
how does it add to -- to steal the word -- humanics? I think that's
what it does, it allows us to be natural but also be present.
Julie: Yeah. And another thing
to add to Engage, I think one of the most momentous moments for me
when I was a part of just recently the Educators In VR International
Summit, and I was onstage with my husband and partner, Alan Smithson,
and I was being interviewed by Steve Bambury. And then Daniel
Dyboski-Bryant -- who is producing the event with Lorelle [VanFossen]
-- came on stage, and reached out and shook my hand, and it vibrated.
James: [chuckles] The haptics.
Julie: Yeah. And this is where
haptics in those interactions start to happen, where it feels real.
And I remember just feeling a tingle. And I have to say that, because
that's how I felt. Daniel was in the UK and I was here in my house in
Toronto, Canada, and I felt that handshake in my hand. And it's that
moment of, "Wow, I'm here. And I felt that." And this is
where interactions start to happen that bring us into the spatial
presence. And haptics are certainly going to play a huge part of it.
James: Sure.
Julie: But it also starts with
the mind and it starts with that mindfulness of being able to be
present, engage, and to kind of have a relationship with the
technology, that you're comfortable enough to be there. That's a huge
part of something that we're working on at XR Collaboration right
now. The project that I'm producing -- if you want to take a look at
that, xrcollaboration.com -- that's featuring over 70 different
collaboration platforms that are meant for both industry and
education. And the discovery of how to be there in a collaboration
space is a conversation that's starting to spark up a lot, because I
think we need people to feel that in order to have the success of
collaboration and communication. We have to have them feel that, or
else we're not going to reach the goals of what the purpose of
collaborating is.
James: You know, when you get
down to it -- and I don't want to nerd out too much on this -- but
there's no difference between what we have in the touch sensory, like
the energy that travels through to let us know from our senses that
we're touching something, versus the electronic signals that are sent
over long distances over the Internet from one controller to the next
to create haptics. There's not much difference. The only thing is the
input methodologies are not as advanced as what they're going to be
in the coming years. But when you felt that you were probably the
same way when I felt that the first time was, "Wow, that's
amazing." But instantly you start thinking about what the
potential is from that.
Julie: Yeah.
James: And you go, "Oh my
gosh. This is where we're at right now. What is it going to be like
in four years, five years, 20 years from now? What is that going to
look like?" And you start to really understand that something
like this pandemic happens again in 20 years. We may be -- as a
world, as humans -- be more prepared for that, in terms of the impact
that social distancing is having on us emotionally right now, the
impact it's having on education right now, the impact it's having on
the economy right now. Where, "Okay, great. All right. Well,
we're just gonna continue doing what we're gonna do, and we're gonna
do it using digital spatial presence."
Julie: Exactly. Let's draw back
to our little K-12s. The future of all of this entire ecosystem and
the future of humanity. And how do we engage with them with some of
the barriers that we have, not just only with the school systems and
Privacy Acts and things like that, but how do we use this technology
to the best benefit? So I'd love to hear about some of the things
that you're discussing, and how do you suggest to introduce K-12 into
your immersive technology?
James: It is-- one of the
things, and especially my teachers, when they hear this, they'll
probably say "Mm-hm!" I'm a real stickler for things like
privacy policies and terms of service, because I'm really interested
with how the data that is being collected. Because now that data is
en masse, like it is a ton of data, especially when it comes to
spatial learning. There's a lot of data that is occurring. And how
much of that is user data versus programming data is up for debate,
but I'm really concerned about that, especially for our young
students. And so that is kind of tied in with my fascination that I
have with federal regulation and guidelines. One of the things that I
really like to do is examine number one, new technology comes out.
Let me see what they say their terms of service are as it relates to
the age groups. And if they say, yes, we are COPPA compliant, which
-- I won't bore people with a lot of acronyms -- but this is
something that went into effect in the early 2000s. It was a part of
the CIPA that came in, which was Internet privacy protocols, or to
protect students from inappropriate things on the Internet. But COPPA
was really for vendors, when they're creating things to say, "No,
children under the age of 13, we are not collecting data from them,
that we know of." And that's kind of a little caveat. Or
sometimes they'll say, "If you're under 13, you can't use it
all, because we're not really monitoring what type of-- what age
groups of data we're getting from, or that's not gonna be a part of
our thing." And so that creates some difficulties for up to
seventh grade, for the most part, with trying to figure out what
tools to use. I'm very fortunate to live in the day and time that we
do where the world, even though it is growing, it is getting smaller
by connectivity. And so these companies, it's really easy to reach
out to them and say your terms of service are not quite aligning with
what you're marketing towards these age groups. And I think your tool
is great, and what you're providing is a great experience. But can we
do some things to get your terms of service in line with usage for
these age groups? And so I work with companies to help frame that and
to bring that to their attention. In some companies that haven't even
had an EDU model, they have switched over to EDU models -- and not
just because of me, there's other educators that are hounding on them
to do this, too -- to be able to give these experiences to the
younger age groups, where public schools, independent schools,
private schools, parochial schools can all use this with younger
ages. And for the most part, that deals with augmented reality.
Without getting to head mounted display VR -- that's a whole other
story -- but AR is really the entry point for those age groups. And
the tools that are used to experience and also create multiples out
there that are fully compliant, not just with COPPA, but if you're in
the EU, the GDRP. Companies like CoSpaces EDU, which is wonderful.
Based out of Munich, it's a wonderful company. Eugene and crew,
they're phenomenal people, they listen to a lot of feedback. And
they're fully COPPA compliant here in the States, and they're GDRP
compliant in the EU, and it can be used for all age groups. And so
you can experience augmented reality, even room scale augmented
reality, which is really fun, especially for those that really want
an immersive experience. You can throw it out in AR, which you can
actually have buildings blow up, so you can actually walk around and
through buildings. And companies like Merge EDU, their terms of
service for things like their Merge Cube and stuff like that, and
their Explorer platform are really conducive to those younger age
groups. And so that's really where I concentrate the most on, with
those age groups. And of course, you kind of get into a head-mounted
display stuff with companies like what Google does with Expeditions,
down to the age of seven. So you have a little bit of that. And
certainly, you can work with companies and you can get parents to
sign off on waivers and schools and districts to allow usage of
head-mounted display as long as it fits, physically, the children's
IPD and stuff like that. But that's really when they start to get
older.
Julie: Yeah. So I guess that
kind of leads to the fact that the younger generation is learning a
lot faster, too. And that's a whole big pack of worms. And the fact
that kids now have access to technology that provides them with
learning faster and the tools that are becoming available, they're
becoming-- I don't want to say smarter faster, but smarter at a
younger age, that they're able to take on different things, that age
group of 13. I can't even imagine. My daughter's only 12 right now.
And I can't imagine not having that technology available to her later
than that. There's quite an age difference and an age gap, that we're
going to have to fill that with technology engagement some way in
order to number one, keep them engaged, that we don't lose them into
the abyss of not liking learning, because they don't have access to
anything that's applicable to their lives. But that's something that
certainly needs to be addressed too, is this earlier age in this that
kids as young as 14, 15, 16 are coming up with solutions to world
problems, that we should be listening to them, right?
James: We need to be
encouraging, especially those that we know that the hardware itself
and the software itself allows for comfort and for our terms of use
for this. We really need to be using that with students a lot,
because they are going to-- maybe it's just consumption. But even
from that consumption, the ideas that are sparked from that spatial
presence that's felt in this type of technology, it could change
someone's life. And it may not be something big. It may be something
small like a little pebble that causes a lot of ripples. It may start
them down a path to where they could truly impact humanity on a large
scale, just because at an earlier age they were exposed and they
experienced things, that when me and you were their age, we wouldn't
have been able to experience because we were lucky if we got a field
trip to the other side of the city. So, yeah, I think it's really
important that we harness this technology, especially when companies
have created it for their age groups, and you have developers that
are making things that are applicable to those age groups. I think
it's vitally important that we do that.
Julie: Well, James, thank you so
much for our conversation today. There's so much that we can go down
the path of. And I'd love to bring you back into another session down
the road, where we start to see some of the different things that are
happening in the schools. I know that even my daughter's schools are
changing the way that they're teaching. And there's so many different
conversations about the content, the curriculum, the methods, the
responses of the students, and that sort of thing. So I think we need
to schedule a part two to this, as we try and focus on that
micro-learning part. Let's get everybody digesting on this. I'd love
to have you close off with some lessons for our listeners, advising
on what you're seeing and how to get through these next few months.
James: Probably the most
important thing -- especially to the lessons from now until where we
can all meet back face to face -- is focus on being kind to each
other and having patience. That's probably at the basis of it. But
then from that point, it's now a time that we can be a little more
exploratory, because there's a lot of lax on summative assessments
that are happening and standardized testing that's happening. So now
is the time that we can actually encourage our children and our
students to explore things that maybe they don't have an opportunity
to normally explore in school. So things like going and checking out
things that are in AR if you're in elementary school, absolutely. I
mean, even if it's something as simple as going into the App Store or
Google Play store or typing in "AR" and seeing those
options that come up, or checking out CoSpaces EDU for things that
are out there. You can check Twitter for teachers that are created
things, or students that have created things. I've got one on my
Twitter page. It may be the pinned tweet that talks about
storytelling in AR, and how you can create fragmented and branched
storytelling in augmented reality. Or if it's something like even
about empathy development through VR for older age groups. You can
literally just go to YouTube and type in "empathy 360" or
something like that, or you just Google it. Steve Bambury has a
really good site, VirtualiTeach, where he talks about some really
good empathy experiences in VR. So go check out Steve Bambury's site
and look at that. But these are the times where we can start to look
at these alternative things, or what has been seen as alternative.
They're actually really impactful.
Julie: Well, that's a great way
to end off this podcast session. Thank you so much, James, for
speaking with me today on the XR for Learning podcast. If you know a
teacher or parent that's struggling, reach out to them, because
they're certainly going through some heavy changes personally, I'm
sure, as well as professionally.
James: Thank you so much, Julie.
I appreciate it.
Julie: Thanks so much. James.
View all episodes
By Julie Smithson
5
11 ratings
“Pivoting” isn’t just an industry term anymore - in the wake of COVID-19, educators have had to pivot as well, quickly adopting XR collaboration and video conferencing technologies just to teach their students. Educational consultant and innovation director James McCrary explains how his most important work lately is just making sure teachers and parents are adjusting to the new norm.
Julie: Ok. Hello, my name is
Julie Smithson, and I am your XR for Learning podcast host. I look
forward to bringing you insight into changing the way that we learn
and teach, using XR technologies to explore, enhance, and
individualize learning for everyone. Today, my guest, James McCrary,
is an educator located in Baton Rouge, Louisiana. And since 2012, he
began presenting at state, regional, and national conferences such as
LAC-- what--
James: Yeah, that's LACU.
Julie: LACU! And FETC and CUE
and ISTE, on topics around 3D and immersion technology. He is a
co-founder of Singularity Media Group, which specializes in spatial
awareness, and learning in augmented and virtual reality. He also
hosts the VR podcast in Simulation Live, discussing the impact of
immersion technology. In 2019, he was recognized as an Apple
Distinguished Educator and Google Certified Educator for his work
integrating immersion technology into the classroom and positively
impacting students globally. Recently, he began partnering with LSU
College of Education, Faculty and Research on virtual reality with
pre-service educators, and as the incoming president of ISTE Virtual
Environments. Thanks so much for joining me, James.
James: Oh yeah. Thank you so
much for having me. I mean, I love talking about this stuff. And so I
think podcasting just lends itself to me just kind of rambling on a
little bit, so... [chuckles]
Julie: [laughs] Amazing. Well,
there's so many things to talk about in education today. And I know
I'd love for you to share with our listeners a little bit about what
you do on a daily basis, and how you're making the biggest impact as
your role of director of technology and working with schools in
Louisiana to introduce immersive technologies.
James: Primarily, right now my
direct role is I am a director technology at -- essentially -- an
elementary school through fifth grade. And the thing that we focused
on the most right now is a augmented reality, both in terms of
consumption and creation. And I work with other schools in the area.
I'm very fortunate to have really good relationships with a lot of
other directors of technology, not just in our area, but in our
surrounding extended metro area, in our state, even in surrounding
states. And I've been kind of adopted [chuckles] by other
organizations in Florida and California that have graciously allowed
me to interact with their schools, their students, and their teachers
to kind of go beyond just AR and looking at other type of spatial
learning, using things like head mounted display, VR experiences,
both in terms of consumption and also creation and collaboration. And
so on a daily basis, throughout the day, I'm working with teachers
and students, obviously with their technology needs, but also
integrating the AR methodologies, primarily using things like
CoSpaces and Merge EDU -- that's two of the biggest ones that we use
-- but also in the evenings, and on weekends, and times that I take
off with other schools to implement those other levels of technology
that we just talked about.
Julie: That's great. I have to
ask, how has that role changed for you since Covid has changed the
way that students learn? You know, implementing that into schools is
obviously a challenge *without* having a pandemic being a part of the
solution.
James: It's-- [chuckles] Well,
I'll tell you, my sleeping schedule is very bizarre. It is not
normal. But it has been interesting. I like to consider myself a
techie. I love technology. And it's obviously what brought me out of
the classroom and into this role of technology and being able to lead
people in that. But I will tell you that even with kind of seeing
some of this coming, just paying attention to what was happening in
China, I don't think that I was physically and emotionally prepared
for what was going to come, when our governor had closing schools and
issuing the stay at home. Which -- on the record -- I'm 100 percent
behind, I think it's necessary. But I have found myself doing remote
work that I felt that I'd actually enjoy greatly. But it is a little
taxing if you're not used to it and it's a little bit of a change
from going to a physical place. And so a lot of my time for the first
two or three weeks was just making sure that our-- that all of our
teachers and administrators were okay with what we were doing. That
they feel comfortable communicating with their students, with their
parents, and then spending a lot of time during that -- and even
after that and continuing still -- talking to our parents. Are they
comfortable? Because thinking about elementary school, it's-- you're
communicating a lot more with the parents and making sure that
they're OK. Because they're staying at home, they're working, but
they also have children that they're now becoming the de facto
educator in their child's life. And you're trying to make sure that
they're mentally OK, and that they're not overwhelmed with the things
that are being sent out to them, and just trying to be mindful. So I
think the biggest shift for me during this whole process has been
less about the technology, and more about developing relationships
through distance, which has been an interesting concept to grasp.
It's more psychological in nature. So that's really been the biggest
shift that I've seen.
Julie: That's so interesting,
how something like this can shift your whole role -- essentially --
to such an important-- part of the puzzle is that mental well-being.
I have lots of conversations about the biggest investment in
education right now we need to give is the investment of well-being
for our teachers, and making sure that their knowledge transfer can
be brought to a remote presence for these children who are learning
from home. And their role continues to hold its value. And also they
transition into the demand and need that the kids are now asking of
them, as well as the parents asking of them. And then on top of that,
these teachers have their own families at home, some of them with
toddlers running at their feet.
James: Yes. [laughs]
Julie: It's an unbelievable
situation when you start to tell the story about that. So good for
you for supporting teachers that way. And I hope that is something
that's continued through every community and region and education
system globally, to recognize teachers in that sense too, making sure
they're OK. And then on top of that, making sure parents are OK.
Everybody's affected by this pandemic -- in one way or another -- in
so many different ways. And right now the ability to transfer those
lessons into a remote learning package that works for everybody
functionally is an overwhelming thought.
James: We've talked before about
that word, "pivot". It's not just for industry anymore. It
is for education. There's a lot of pivoting happening. And that word
you use -- "functionality" -- is the big component. I think
the functionality of how we're doing distance learning -- whether
it's online, whether it's analog or whatever the case may be -- you
have to be really quick on feedback on being able to pivot what
you're doing as an educator, as a leader, as a parent, as a student,
to making sure that all the parties involved are growing in terms of
not just academics, but also in relationship or most importantly,
foundationally, emotionally.
Julie: So that leads to a really
important part of what you do is immersive education, both in the
storytelling and understanding the power of being spatially present.
Last year I wrote an article, actually, and it was about "it's
time to teach in an voxels instead of pixels" and engaging into
three-dimensional learning, that we live in a three-dimensional
world, why are we not teaching it? Obviously, there's a lot of people
who have us that way. And this is the introduction to spatial
learning. And now that we're being moved into this remote presence of
learning from home -- or working from home -- being spatially present
and having that engagement and understanding the humanics behind it.
And I use that term, it's a brand new one that I'm trying to
socialize, because it's the engagement of having the ability to speak
freely, just as you and I are having this conversation. But then also
understanding the data analytics behind us and the technologies that
are taking place that immerse us into this experience. So how do we
build humanics into our spatial presence, and be engaged in these
immersive experiences to get the most out of what they're intended to
do?
James: The interesting thing--
and I love that word. I don't think I've actually heard it. And when
you said it, it resonated with me. As soon as you said it, I knew
exactly what it meant. I'm not sure if it's a real word.
Julie: Actually, it's funny. If
you look it up, if you type it into a Google doc, it will spell
"humanics" wrong, which is so ironic. You'll have to try
that, because spell check won't even accept humanics, which is almost
like-- it's the rebuttal of the robot ecosystem, they're saying, "No,
they can't learn that word!" [laughs]
James: I would tell spellcheck
the same thing that Thor said, which is "all words are made up."
OK?
Julie: [laughs]
James: So just go with that. But
I think that it really is an interesting thing to think about. Dr.
Jeremy Bailenson -- who have just immense respect for -- he has been
talking about this video conferencing fatigue that we have. And it's
not something that's just that he's talking about, a lot of people
are talking about. And that's kind of like our stepping stone into
trying to have the spatial presence is, "Oh, I'm going to go
beyond just a phone conversation. I'm going to have video." The
problem is we are face to face with each other, almost video
conferencing things in a very unnatural way for extended periods of
time. I mean, we're not all like people in a newscast, where that's
just the norm, where cameras are our faces and we're seeing people up
close and we're having to kind of engage. And he has a solution that
he mentions on that. But it really got me thinking in terms of what
spatial presence is and what spatial learning looks like. And it's
multifaceted. But one of the components that I think about, we think
about collaboration is OK, you have Zoom, you have Google Meets, then
you have Teams, you have things like that. How can you take that to
the next level, where you can create that natural distance that you
have, like when we're having conversations face to face where you can
look away, you can pull away, or whatever. And that would be
something like Engage, which I love Engage. I think Engage is one of
the best platforms for VR that allows me to go in, and I can walk
up-- if Julie's in Engage and I'm in Engage, I can walk up and have a
conversation with you. But so-and-so is over there, and I'm going to
go, I'm walk over and talk to them. Or if I want to pull away from
the conversation, I will. I'll go and I'll sit somewhere else. And
all the while I can still engage as much as I want, but I can also
pull back from that. And that's just a little snippet of what does
spatial really mean, and what does it add to the conversation? And
how does it add to -- to steal the word -- humanics? I think that's
what it does, it allows us to be natural but also be present.
Julie: Yeah. And another thing
to add to Engage, I think one of the most momentous moments for me
when I was a part of just recently the Educators In VR International
Summit, and I was onstage with my husband and partner, Alan Smithson,
and I was being interviewed by Steve Bambury. And then Daniel
Dyboski-Bryant -- who is producing the event with Lorelle [VanFossen]
-- came on stage, and reached out and shook my hand, and it vibrated.
James: [chuckles] The haptics.
Julie: Yeah. And this is where
haptics in those interactions start to happen, where it feels real.
And I remember just feeling a tingle. And I have to say that, because
that's how I felt. Daniel was in the UK and I was here in my house in
Toronto, Canada, and I felt that handshake in my hand. And it's that
moment of, "Wow, I'm here. And I felt that." And this is
where interactions start to happen that bring us into the spatial
presence. And haptics are certainly going to play a huge part of it.
James: Sure.
Julie: But it also starts with
the mind and it starts with that mindfulness of being able to be
present, engage, and to kind of have a relationship with the
technology, that you're comfortable enough to be there. That's a huge
part of something that we're working on at XR Collaboration right
now. The project that I'm producing -- if you want to take a look at
that, xrcollaboration.com -- that's featuring over 70 different
collaboration platforms that are meant for both industry and
education. And the discovery of how to be there in a collaboration
space is a conversation that's starting to spark up a lot, because I
think we need people to feel that in order to have the success of
collaboration and communication. We have to have them feel that, or
else we're not going to reach the goals of what the purpose of
collaborating is.
James: You know, when you get
down to it -- and I don't want to nerd out too much on this -- but
there's no difference between what we have in the touch sensory, like
the energy that travels through to let us know from our senses that
we're touching something, versus the electronic signals that are sent
over long distances over the Internet from one controller to the next
to create haptics. There's not much difference. The only thing is the
input methodologies are not as advanced as what they're going to be
in the coming years. But when you felt that you were probably the
same way when I felt that the first time was, "Wow, that's
amazing." But instantly you start thinking about what the
potential is from that.
Julie: Yeah.
James: And you go, "Oh my
gosh. This is where we're at right now. What is it going to be like
in four years, five years, 20 years from now? What is that going to
look like?" And you start to really understand that something
like this pandemic happens again in 20 years. We may be -- as a
world, as humans -- be more prepared for that, in terms of the impact
that social distancing is having on us emotionally right now, the
impact it's having on education right now, the impact it's having on
the economy right now. Where, "Okay, great. All right. Well,
we're just gonna continue doing what we're gonna do, and we're gonna
do it using digital spatial presence."
Julie: Exactly. Let's draw back
to our little K-12s. The future of all of this entire ecosystem and
the future of humanity. And how do we engage with them with some of
the barriers that we have, not just only with the school systems and
Privacy Acts and things like that, but how do we use this technology
to the best benefit? So I'd love to hear about some of the things
that you're discussing, and how do you suggest to introduce K-12 into
your immersive technology?
James: It is-- one of the
things, and especially my teachers, when they hear this, they'll
probably say "Mm-hm!" I'm a real stickler for things like
privacy policies and terms of service, because I'm really interested
with how the data that is being collected. Because now that data is
en masse, like it is a ton of data, especially when it comes to
spatial learning. There's a lot of data that is occurring. And how
much of that is user data versus programming data is up for debate,
but I'm really concerned about that, especially for our young
students. And so that is kind of tied in with my fascination that I
have with federal regulation and guidelines. One of the things that I
really like to do is examine number one, new technology comes out.
Let me see what they say their terms of service are as it relates to
the age groups. And if they say, yes, we are COPPA compliant, which
-- I won't bore people with a lot of acronyms -- but this is
something that went into effect in the early 2000s. It was a part of
the CIPA that came in, which was Internet privacy protocols, or to
protect students from inappropriate things on the Internet. But COPPA
was really for vendors, when they're creating things to say, "No,
children under the age of 13, we are not collecting data from them,
that we know of." And that's kind of a little caveat. Or
sometimes they'll say, "If you're under 13, you can't use it
all, because we're not really monitoring what type of-- what age
groups of data we're getting from, or that's not gonna be a part of
our thing." And so that creates some difficulties for up to
seventh grade, for the most part, with trying to figure out what
tools to use. I'm very fortunate to live in the day and time that we
do where the world, even though it is growing, it is getting smaller
by connectivity. And so these companies, it's really easy to reach
out to them and say your terms of service are not quite aligning with
what you're marketing towards these age groups. And I think your tool
is great, and what you're providing is a great experience. But can we
do some things to get your terms of service in line with usage for
these age groups? And so I work with companies to help frame that and
to bring that to their attention. In some companies that haven't even
had an EDU model, they have switched over to EDU models -- and not
just because of me, there's other educators that are hounding on them
to do this, too -- to be able to give these experiences to the
younger age groups, where public schools, independent schools,
private schools, parochial schools can all use this with younger
ages. And for the most part, that deals with augmented reality.
Without getting to head mounted display VR -- that's a whole other
story -- but AR is really the entry point for those age groups. And
the tools that are used to experience and also create multiples out
there that are fully compliant, not just with COPPA, but if you're in
the EU, the GDRP. Companies like CoSpaces EDU, which is wonderful.
Based out of Munich, it's a wonderful company. Eugene and crew,
they're phenomenal people, they listen to a lot of feedback. And
they're fully COPPA compliant here in the States, and they're GDRP
compliant in the EU, and it can be used for all age groups. And so
you can experience augmented reality, even room scale augmented
reality, which is really fun, especially for those that really want
an immersive experience. You can throw it out in AR, which you can
actually have buildings blow up, so you can actually walk around and
through buildings. And companies like Merge EDU, their terms of
service for things like their Merge Cube and stuff like that, and
their Explorer platform are really conducive to those younger age
groups. And so that's really where I concentrate the most on, with
those age groups. And of course, you kind of get into a head-mounted
display stuff with companies like what Google does with Expeditions,
down to the age of seven. So you have a little bit of that. And
certainly, you can work with companies and you can get parents to
sign off on waivers and schools and districts to allow usage of
head-mounted display as long as it fits, physically, the children's
IPD and stuff like that. But that's really when they start to get
older.
Julie: Yeah. So I guess that
kind of leads to the fact that the younger generation is learning a
lot faster, too. And that's a whole big pack of worms. And the fact
that kids now have access to technology that provides them with
learning faster and the tools that are becoming available, they're
becoming-- I don't want to say smarter faster, but smarter at a
younger age, that they're able to take on different things, that age
group of 13. I can't even imagine. My daughter's only 12 right now.
And I can't imagine not having that technology available to her later
than that. There's quite an age difference and an age gap, that we're
going to have to fill that with technology engagement some way in
order to number one, keep them engaged, that we don't lose them into
the abyss of not liking learning, because they don't have access to
anything that's applicable to their lives. But that's something that
certainly needs to be addressed too, is this earlier age in this that
kids as young as 14, 15, 16 are coming up with solutions to world
problems, that we should be listening to them, right?
James: We need to be
encouraging, especially those that we know that the hardware itself
and the software itself allows for comfort and for our terms of use
for this. We really need to be using that with students a lot,
because they are going to-- maybe it's just consumption. But even
from that consumption, the ideas that are sparked from that spatial
presence that's felt in this type of technology, it could change
someone's life. And it may not be something big. It may be something
small like a little pebble that causes a lot of ripples. It may start
them down a path to where they could truly impact humanity on a large
scale, just because at an earlier age they were exposed and they
experienced things, that when me and you were their age, we wouldn't
have been able to experience because we were lucky if we got a field
trip to the other side of the city. So, yeah, I think it's really
important that we harness this technology, especially when companies
have created it for their age groups, and you have developers that
are making things that are applicable to those age groups. I think
it's vitally important that we do that.
Julie: Well, James, thank you so
much for our conversation today. There's so much that we can go down
the path of. And I'd love to bring you back into another session down
the road, where we start to see some of the different things that are
happening in the schools. I know that even my daughter's schools are
changing the way that they're teaching. And there's so many different
conversations about the content, the curriculum, the methods, the
responses of the students, and that sort of thing. So I think we need
to schedule a part two to this, as we try and focus on that
micro-learning part. Let's get everybody digesting on this. I'd love
to have you close off with some lessons for our listeners, advising
on what you're seeing and how to get through these next few months.
James: Probably the most
important thing -- especially to the lessons from now until where we
can all meet back face to face -- is focus on being kind to each
other and having patience. That's probably at the basis of it. But
then from that point, it's now a time that we can be a little more
exploratory, because there's a lot of lax on summative assessments
that are happening and standardized testing that's happening. So now
is the time that we can actually encourage our children and our
students to explore things that maybe they don't have an opportunity
to normally explore in school. So things like going and checking out
things that are in AR if you're in elementary school, absolutely. I
mean, even if it's something as simple as going into the App Store or
Google Play store or typing in "AR" and seeing those
options that come up, or checking out CoSpaces EDU for things that
are out there. You can check Twitter for teachers that are created
things, or students that have created things. I've got one on my
Twitter page. It may be the pinned tweet that talks about
storytelling in AR, and how you can create fragmented and branched
storytelling in augmented reality. Or if it's something like even
about empathy development through VR for older age groups. You can
literally just go to YouTube and type in "empathy 360" or
something like that, or you just Google it. Steve Bambury has a
really good site, VirtualiTeach, where he talks about some really
good empathy experiences in VR. So go check out Steve Bambury's site
and look at that. But these are the times where we can start to look
at these alternative things, or what has been seen as alternative.
They're actually really impactful.
Julie: Well, that's a great way
to end off this podcast session. Thank you so much, James, for
speaking with me today on the XR for Learning podcast. If you know a
teacher or parent that's struggling, reach out to them, because
they're certainly going through some heavy changes personally, I'm
sure, as well as professionally.
James: Thank you so much, Julie.
I appreciate it.
Julie: Thanks so much. James.