TY - GEN
T1 - Evaluating the effectiveness of Virtual reality as an interactive educational resource for additive manufacturing
AU - Ostrander, John K.
AU - Tucker, Conrad S.
AU - Simpson, Timothy W.
AU - Meisel, Nicholas A.
N1 - Funding Information:
This research was conducted with support from the National Science Foundation (NSF) under Grant No. CMMI-1547021, and the Penn State Center for Online Innovation Learning (COIL) through their Research Initiation Grant program. Any opinions, findings, and conclusions in this paper are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the views of NSF or COIL.
Publisher Copyright:
Copyright © 2018 ASME.
PY - 2018
Y1 - 2018
N2 - Demand for a highly skilled workforce in the field of additive manufacturing (AM) is growing but is underserved due to limited academic course offerings and high barriers for incorporating industrial AM systems into education. Virtual reality (VR) is proposed as a medium to help teach introductory concepts of AM to a broader audience in an interactive, scalable manner. Before implementing VR as a standard tool to teach the concepts of AM, we must evaluate the effectiveness of this medium for the subject. Our research aims to answer the question: can VR be used to teach introductory concepts of additive manufacturing in a way that is as effective as teaching the same concepts in a physical setting? The research looks at the learning differences between two groups: (1) students exposed to an interactive AM lesson in a traditional physical setting and (2) students exposed to the same lesson within a virtual environment. The study assesses participants’ AM knowledge through pre-/post-AM lesson evaluation. AM conceptual knowledge gained and changes in self-efficacy are evaluated to make an argument for the effectiveness of VR as an AM learning tool.
AB - Demand for a highly skilled workforce in the field of additive manufacturing (AM) is growing but is underserved due to limited academic course offerings and high barriers for incorporating industrial AM systems into education. Virtual reality (VR) is proposed as a medium to help teach introductory concepts of AM to a broader audience in an interactive, scalable manner. Before implementing VR as a standard tool to teach the concepts of AM, we must evaluate the effectiveness of this medium for the subject. Our research aims to answer the question: can VR be used to teach introductory concepts of additive manufacturing in a way that is as effective as teaching the same concepts in a physical setting? The research looks at the learning differences between two groups: (1) students exposed to an interactive AM lesson in a traditional physical setting and (2) students exposed to the same lesson within a virtual environment. The study assesses participants’ AM knowledge through pre-/post-AM lesson evaluation. AM conceptual knowledge gained and changes in self-efficacy are evaluated to make an argument for the effectiveness of VR as an AM learning tool.
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U2 - 10.1115/DETC2018-86036
DO - 10.1115/DETC2018-86036
M3 - Conference contribution
AN - SCOPUS:85056851974
T3 - Proceedings of the ASME Design Engineering Technical Conference
BT - 20th International Conference on Advanced Vehicle Technologies; 15th International Conference on Design Education
PB - American Society of Mechanical Engineers (ASME)
T2 - ASME 2018 International Design Engineering Technical Conferences and Computers and Information in Engineering Conference, IDETC/CIE 2018
Y2 - 26 August 2018 through 29 August 2018
ER -