Browsing by Author "Salakka, Juulia"

Virtual reality (VR) has emerged as a potential teaching tool in the educational field during the last decade. The use of virtual reality as a teaching tool has been made possible due to technological advances but related research is still relatively limited. The purpose of this exploratory thesis is to explore the possibilities of virtual reality in the Finnish school context by examining the user experiences of secondary students in the use of virtual reality teaching. 68 secondary school students from 7th and 9th grade participated in the study. The material was acquired using an online questionnaire from the VISIOT project, which was answered by volunteers after a virtual reality learning session. Most of the data was analyzed using quantitative analysis methods. The open-source questions of the questionnaire utilized data-driven content analysis. VR was considered easy to use and comfortable to use in the name of usability. Students found the use of virtual reality enjoyable for the device and the application. Based on closed and open responses from an emotional point of view, the use of virtual reality in teaching aroused mostly positive feelings. Based on previous research, positive feelings have been found to have a positive relationship with learning and learning success. Students felt that virtual reality is suited for working in different types of group sizes. Based on the results, students would be willing to use virtual reality to support learning in their future studies. There was a statistically significant difference in perceived ease of use in terms of gender, grade level, and perceived self-confidence. Girls found the use of virtual reality a little more difficult than boys, as did 7th graders compared to 9th graders. 7th graders using Google Earth VR expected the view to be more up-to-date than 9th graders. Students who felt they were still practicing VR use found using the device more difficult and enjoyed the device and application statistically significantly lower than students who felt confident in their ability to use virtual reality. Based on the above results, as well as other literature, it would appear that self-efficacy has an impact on the learning process. All in all, the results of this thesis show that the use of virtual reality in teaching seems to be potential, and the students seem to be motivated to use it to support teaching.