Sophisticated Virtual Reality Training with Schaeffler and Materna TMT
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The use of virtual reality training brings many advantages to corporate education. Entire learning worlds can be projected cost-effectively and the behavior of employees in a hazardous work environment can also be simulated. The automotive supplier Schaeffler has already been using this for several years. And has now additionally developed a didactic meta-model to enable even more efficient teaching of learning content in VR environments in the future.
Category:
DIDACTICS
Project partners:
Schaeffler Technologies AG & Co. KG
&
Materna TMT GmbH
Didactic metamodel increases learning efficiency
More than 80,000 employees worldwide work for the automotive supplier and mechanical engineering company Schaeffler. In 2020, the company generated sales of approximately 12.6 billion euros with its workforce. In-company training in the international group plays a decisive role and should also help tackle the structural change in the industry with commitment and success. Contributing to always having the right qualifications on board. As a large company, Schaeffler brings the financial strength to also engage with new technologies such as virtual reality and to target maximum benefits from this still fairly new digital mediation method.
Learning needs
Schaeffler Technologies is planning to use virtual reality training measures as a didactically sensible addition to the existing classroom, e-learning and blended learning offerings for various areas of the company. The reasons for this include the fully immersive training options and the simple distribution of the training courses to all global training areas. In the final stage of development, the VR training courses are to cover a very broad spectrum and be available worldwide in different languages. In this way, the new technology is to support the training of technical employees in the area of product assembly and machine operation (e.g. retooling, repair, operation, etc.) as well as the basic and advanced training of employees and for soft skill training (e.g. communication, personnel management, stress management, etc.).
Learning work steps in virtual reality
In a 3rd person view, employees of Schaeffler Technologies AG, initially primarily store floor employees, learn technical basics for their work. In the screenshot shown, a hammer is to be operated first, before several further work steps follow.
According to the company, in the past it became apparent that the creation of VR training courses worked without any problems, but that these did not follow a concrete didactic approach. This meant that, on the one hand, the desired increase in knowledge among the people to be trained could not be conclusively ensured, measured and tracked and, on the other hand, the used methods could not be easily transferred to further training courses.
The challenge posed is therefore to develop a generic approach that generates intuitive and learning-efficient VR training on the basis of the modeled work steps and work sequences and the didactic meta-model to be developed. The meta-model should be flexible and generic enough to cover the entire problem class of different training scenarios and be transferable to a variety of VR training cases.
The target group initially includes primarily shop employees, i.e., commercial employees in production. Since a lot of technical training has to be conducted for these employees and a lot of personnel has to be trained worldwide, this employee group was selected first. In the further course of the VR training project, other employee groups and thus also learning content are to follow.
METHODS
Project progress
The project comprised several milestones. First, Schaeffler took care of the theoretical research from the large pool of specialist disciplines such as pedagogy (here especially didactics), psychology, sociology and neurophysiology. This enabled the project management to first obtain an overview of relevant theories and to derive parameters for the focus on corporate learning. Subsequently, a knowledge map was designed. This was followed by a reduction to a canonical value base so that closely related parameters could be mapped more compactly. In a further step, the elaboration and unfolding of the elaborated values in relation to VR training took place. Subsequently, a prototypical testing of implemented recommendations for action could take place in a VR training sandbox system. Subsequently, the project team took over the selection and transfer of the results in preparation for the implementation in the VR Training productive system. Finally, the roll-out of the VR trainings to pilot users could take place.
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Basically, this was a project with an agile approach. After the initial research phase, goals were defined and worked through in sprints on the part of Materna TMT and Schaeffler. Regular (virtual) meetings were held to discuss interim statuses and agree on the next steps. At the end of each sprint, a review meeting was held to present the results of the sprint. Finally, the goals for the next sprint were defined and broken down to the respective responsible parties. Schaeffler developed the didactic model and the individual recommendations for action together with employees of Materna TMT. And Schaeffler employees continued to drive forward the implementation of the authoring tool.
In addition to the technical support provided by the Schaeffler team from the "Corporate IT & Digitalization" department, managers from the SchaefflerAcademy department were also involved throughout the project. This ensured that, on the one hand, internal experience and specifications for training were taken into account and, on the other hand, the results could be further publicized internally directly by the central training organization.
In addition to a permanent further development of the authoring tool, an integration into the central LMS of Schaeffler is planned for the future. This will allow VR training to be booked directly via the intranet, and the results and learning statuses will be transferred to the LMS via a direct interface. Schaeffler expects this step to ensure further dissemination and acceptance of VR training.
Instructions for equipping a machine
Employees learn precise procedures in virtual reality. The second of fifteen steps involves moving a specific door by exactly 0.85 meters. Each individual step is simple and provided with clear instructions so that even more complex operations can be mastered step by step.
Project result
The learning success of the VR training courses established in this way is ensured by levels/certification stages. The difficulty level is successively increased (reduction of hints) up to the final test. Learners can individually select the number of repetitions and independently design the learning path at their own pace in a "protected" environment away from the daily production routine. Evaluation forms after the training sessions are also designed to help improve the training experience. In addition, an on-site trainer can provide support if required.
Schaeffler describes the acceptance among the learners as very high. According to the company, the VR training courses will now be rolled out successively to other locations following initial tests at the main plant in Herzogenaurach. Both trainees and trainers are enthusiastic about the high quality standard. As a digital solution, the scalability represents an additional multiplier for dissemination and gain for all learners. The possibility of bidirectional participation and collaboration on training content for continuous improvement of the content strengthens the motivation and acceptance of the virtual reality solution.
"The combination of a technically intuitive learning platform with a generic didactic learning concept in the backend enables our technical experts to become authors of a variety of virtual trainings. The didactic know-how is automatically embedded in the system. This enables us to conduct training of a very high quality at any time, independent of the availability of real trainers and independent of time and place. "
Jens Ebert
AR/VR Framework – Product Owner
Schaeffler Technologies AG & Co. KG
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Conclusion
Virtual Reality is one of the newer eLearning methods. However, didactic models tailored to it, which explain suitable methods, approaches and process models in more detail and justify their application on a scientific basis and with corresponding literature references, have hardly been found so far. Schaeffler, together with the service provider Materna TMT, has taken on this challenge in an eight-month project and developed an interdisciplinary and practice-oriented approach for its own company. The jury of the eLearning Journal sees this as an important pioneering achievement and therefore honors the two project partners with the eLearning AWARD 2022 in the category of "Didactics".
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INFO
Specifications: Schaeffler would like to develop a didactic concept for VR training courses in order to decisively increase learning efficiency even with this relatively new eLearning method and thus also to raise qualifications within the workforce to an even higher level as well as to further expand competitiveness in this way.
Special features: The automotive supplier believes that this didactic model is the only way to fully exploit the advantages of VR training and is therefore pushing it. Since the project was implemented, the group has also benefited from other advantages of digital training in general, such as uniformity and uncomplicated scalability.