NEW PALESTINE — With every class that came in it was the same, Chris Young said.
The students huddled timidly around a piece of paper taped to the floor, smartphones clutched in their little hands, each unsure of what was to come. There was a quick countdown from the teacher, who instructed the kids to watch the scenes closely.
And then, all at once, there were audible gasps and shouts of excitement as dinosaurs, planets and mountain ranges appeared in front of them.
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A representative from Google recently visited Southern Hancock’s three elementary schools to test drive the tech giant’s newest educational tool — an augmented reality app that aims to bring subject matter off a textbook or website page and onto a student’s desk.
It’s the latest bit of technology developed by Google Expedition, Google’s line of educational apps that aim to give kids a truly immersive educational experience.
The company has been testing the app in select schools across the county since September and hope to release a final version in the coming months.
Augmented reality “allows a computer-generated image to be superimposed on a user’s view of the real world … allowing users to place digital objects in real spaces,” according to Google.
For example, if a high school health class was utilizing the app, each student could have his or her own three-dimensional model of a human skeleton, and each would have the ability to get an up-close look at every bone in the body, even zoom into a bone and see the collagen, tissue and marrow that it’s made up of.
Google caught the attention of schools across the world a few years ago when it released Google Cardboard, a program which allowed teachers to guide students through their choice of more than 100 360-degree field trips. The program made it possible for kids to visit famous landmarks, landscapes, areas of historical significance, bringing the place they read about in their textbook to life using a smartphone and a simple cardboard viewfinder.
This new augmented reality app takes the technology a step further, said Young, Southern Hancock’s strategic learning coordinator.
Where Google Cardboard allowed kids to view places like the Great Barrier Reef in Australia, the augmented reality program puts the reef right in front of them, lets them explore the reef and all the rocks and minerals there, Young said.
Teachers control the experience with a smartphone or tablet, while students explore on their own screens. Google has developed an entire curriculum of augmented reality programs for students in kindergarten through 12th grade to utilize.
And because all Southern Hancock elementary school students have an iPad as part of the district’s one-to-one technology initiative, teachers can start using the new Google Expedition in their daily lessons as soon as it becomes available, Young said.
To access this new technology, students just need to download the app and scan a QR code provided by their teacher. During the tests students did in Southern Hancock this week, kids were paired off with a partner and huddled around a code, printed on a piece of paper that was taped to the floor.
When their teacher gave the high-sign, the students scanned the code and waited for the image to appear.
From there, excitement ensued.
Sixth-graders Vivian Miller and Bella Lawyer dashed around with their classmates at Brandywine Elementary last week, wide-eyed as they explored volcanoes, the solar system and the body’s muscular system.
These are all topics they’ve learned about in their classes, 11-year-old Vivian said; but they’ve never gotten the chance to look at them as closely as the Google app allowed them to.
“It’s really cool,” Vivian said. “It’s a great experience.”
Adding this technology to their teaching toolbox is an exciting prospect for teachers, too, said Jennifer Walker, a fourth-grade teacher at Sugar Creek Elementary, who tested the app with her students this week.
“It’s incredible that we even have the possibility to incorporate this into our classrooms,” she said.
Seeing the kids get into a frenzy about learning, hearing them ask eagerly about when they’d be able to use the augmented reality program again, was rewarding for Young, he said.
Teachers live for that moment when a student really gets whatever lesson they’re going over that day, he said. They crave that moment when a look of understanding spreads over a kid’s face.
With book-learning, those moments can be few and far between.
But immersive education experiences like the one Google is providing should only make those moments more common, he said.
Incorporating technology into the classroom has given kids educational experiences students of the past couldn’t have imagined, he said.