Abstract
The rapidly expanding biotechnology sector horizon is expected to create a surge in demand for expertise underpinning cell and gene therapies, which are recognized as the next generation of medicines. New and innovative approaches to implement active and performative learning in the Molecular Life Sciences are required to support this and to address limitations associated with traditional “front of class” lectern delivery of challenging, three dimensional molecular concepts. Therefore, an immediate need exists for the development and implementation of immersive learning approaches in Virology, Cellular Sciences and Molecular Biology to underpin sustainable development of graduate students for academic and industrial research careers. The Covid-19 pandemic has led to significant changes in the delivery of education globally, with online engagement and accelerated uptake of novel teaching and assessment modalities into majority practice within institutions. This development has been driven by externally imposed necessity and it remains to be seen what form teaching and learning will take post-Covid. Irrespective of the pandemic, technologies are available which can serve intrinsically motivated, discipline specific shifts toward enhanced learner experiences and learning outcomes. Immersive virtual reality offers one such approach to open new entry points for student learning of abstract molecular concepts, which will be just as relevant upon our return to face-to-face teaching. Key to delivering this will be engagement and collaboration by disciplinary and technical experts. Here, we discuss global advances in the area of VR and Molecular Science education and assess potential paths forward for teaching and learning impact and innovative education.
Highlights
There has been a long history of anecdotal evidence for the challenges around teaching and learning in molecular biology (Tibell and Rundgren, 2010)
The Teaching for Understanding (TfU) framework aims to take generative topics, knowledge that is central to a discipline, and allow teachers to better understand what students know, for example through structured tasks known as performances of understanding (Blythe and Perkins, 1998; Wiske, 1998)
It follows that the inability of students to directly experience the molecular world may explain many of the documented learning difficulties in molecular sciences e.g. various aspects of genetics, cell structure and function, and macromolecular structure, as well as issues related to size and scale (Bell, 2001; Tibell and Rundgren, 2010)
Summary
There has been a long history of anecdotal evidence for the challenges around teaching and learning in molecular biology (Tibell and Rundgren, 2010). Immersive visualization may have benefits in research led learning, with Knote and colleagues reporting the benefits of its use in the study of multi-cellular tumor spheroids (Knote et al, 2019) and crystallographic diffraction data (Knote et al, 2020) This has been recognized in other disciplines, whereby the use of VR demonstrated significant benefits to the student learning experience addressing challenging concepts in affine transformations through gamification (Oberdörfer and Latoschik, 2019a). The technology has advanced significantly since and there has been an increase in studies that address the use of mixed reality and virtual systems in teaching and learning in recent years (Kaminska et al, 2018; Cook et al, 2019) These studies have reported better understanding and higher motivation, among other benefits (Hernández-deMenéndez et al.). It is clear from studies that a step-by-step protocol system whereby
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