Microsoft Is Reinventing How You Learn
With the new discoveries being made every day in math, science and business, the human race is advancing towards innovation and new possibilities. Unfortunately, most students see this as another page in a new textbook to read and cram into their brain. I mean you have to admit, over the course of the last 100 years, with new knowledge, the average size of a textbook has been increasing. As a student myself, even when trying to make a sincere effort to appreciate the content and understand it, I find it difficult to do so with plain text. Especially because I am more of a visual learner, as some of you also are, the more complex concepts may take double or even triple the amount of time and effort to grasp.
As human beings, we live and explore in the 3D environment. So why are we still learning in 2-D? Technological capabilities in the past were not advanced enough to introduce 3-D learning. Until now! At Microsoft, engineers have been working hard to bring learning tools from 2-D into 3-D. They call it Mixed Reality, where students are able to combine the digital space with three-dimensional space. It all starts with 3-D content! Research from Microsoft tells us that 3-D improves attention span, engagement, motivation and overall academic performance. In fact, more recently girls tend to enroll in math and science programs at a much higher rate when taking a course in 3-D. That's awesome!
Mixed reality & Paint 3-D
It may seem abstract at first to think about how mixed reality can enhance the classroom environment. Not only that, but it sounds really complicated to use. Fortunately, it’s just as easy as pasting any 2-D image from the internet. The video below shows you a quick 5-minute demonstration of how any student or teacher can use Paint 3-D and PowerPoint. This particular example displays how the moon and the earth line up with the sun to produce an eclipse.
That’s pretty cool, right?
You can right away see the difference in teaching the concept of an eclipse from a picture versus demonstrating it on paint 3-D. On a 2-D space, there would be no visual explanation of why an eclipse does not happen every month of the year. However, with Paint 3-D we can easily see that the moon’s orbit around the earth is tilted. Thus, clearing up the confusion students may have regarding the frequency of eclipses when looking at a model in a textbook. Oh.. and the way they brought the Mars Curiosity Rover to earth was cool too!
Microsoft HoloLens
With the advancements in technology, the range of learning and teaching applications is so wide and interactive that the possibilities are endless. Microsoft is really pushing the boundaries of learning and innovation. One of the coolest products on the list that is becoming more and more popular is HoloLens. Microsoft HoloLens is the first self-contained, holographic computer, enabling you to engage with your digital content and interact with holograms in the world around you. Originally, a concept that was leading the future of the console industry, especially with popular titles such as Minecraft. Hololens has started to branch out into different spaces like education. Universities and medical schools are even using it to simulate real and interactive scenarios!
Imagine students in medical school being able to operate on a holographic person. What about an engineering student working on a holographic plane engine! This is the extent to which we have taken Hololens and the path will surely continue to more immersive teaching and learning styles.
And More....
There seems to be no stopping Microsoft when it comes to the new products and services in the education space. Microsoft Teams, a service which hosts an entirely new experience that brings together people, conversations and content—along with the tools that teams need—so they can easily collaborate to achieve more. In short, it's a platform where groups can collaborate using integrated Office 365 tools and other forms of communication such as Skype for business. To top it all off with a big red cherry, Microsoft announced it's new Surface Laptop. An answer to Apple's Macbook line up, the Surface is aimed towards delivering a thinner, more powerful laptop loaded with all the new features of 3-D and Windows 10 S to students.
This is just a small taste of what could be the future of education. In recent years we have come from an age of physical books to e-books. Now, it looks as though that era is coming to the end. Mixed reality and integration with 3-D learning looks to be a big hit. We are definitely excited to see the results from the next generation of students.