How virtual reality, augmented reality and mixed reality facilitate teacher education: A systematic review

Abstract

AbstractBackgroundVirtual reality (VR), augmented reality (AR) and mixed reality (MR) have sparked recently in improving the effectiveness of teacher education. However, there is a lack of review regarding the utilisation of these technologies in this field. These three technologies, namely VR, AR and MR, can be collectively referred to as extended reality (XR) (as mentioned in reference Tang et al., 2022).ObjectivesRemarkably, the utilisation of XR‐based technologies in teacher education needs to be explored. Moreover, research questions related to the training objectives, methodological features, and the effects of XR‐based teacher education remain unanswered.MethodsTo this end, the present study conducted a systematic review to analyse 52 articles from six databases (including Web of Science, Scopus, IEEE Xplore, ERIC, ScienceDirect, and ACM Digital Library).ResultsThe results indicate that XR technologies have been primarily used to train teachers' procedural knowledge, for instance, classroom management. Furthermore, most studies have primarily focused on pre‐service teachers (PSTs) rather than in‐service teachers and utilised small sample sizes, with VR emerging as the most frequently employed tool. Finally, the majority of the studies reported that XR‐based training affected teachers positively.ConclusionsIt urges researchers and developers to consider theory‐driven training design, which increases the potential to better understand what features of XR promote in‐service teachers' and PSTs' learning and how they do so. This article additionally conducts a SWOT (strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats) analysis of XR‐based teacher education to offer more insightful recommendations and foster further discussion.