VR4Health: personalized teaching and learning anatomy using VR

Abstract

Virtual Reality (VR) is being integrated into many different areas of our lives, from industrial engineering to video-games, and also including teaching and education. We have several examples where VR has been used to engage students and facilitate their 3D spatial understanding, but can VR help also teachers? What are the benefits teachers can obtain on using VR applications? In this paper we present an application (VR4Health) designed to allow students to directly inspect 3D models of several human organs by using Virtual Reality systems. The application is designed to be used in an HMD device autonomously as a self-learning tool and also reports information to teachers in order that he/she becomes aware of what the students do and can redirect his/her work to the concrete necessities of the student. We evaluate both the students’ and the teachers’ perception by doing an experiment and asking them to fill-in a questionnaire at the end of the experiment.