Dreamscape Learn at ASU
Dreamscape Learn at ASU is an education game changer — combining the emotional power of Hollywood storytelling with a fully immersive virtual reality learning experience. We caught up with students after their first virtual reality biology class to hear how it went.
NEWS + RESEARCH
BUSINESS INSIDER: Virtual Reality Edtech Startup Dreamscape Learn Raises Funding
Dreamscape Learn has raised a $20 million
in Series A funding to expand its curriculum
offering and branch outside of ASU. The investors
that participated in the round include Bold Capital
Partners, GSV Ventures, Verizon Ventures, and
Cengage Group...
Dreamscape Learn just finished its largest cohort
yet at ASU for the fall 2022 semester, by the end
of this spring semester, over 7,000 students will
have taken the introductory biology course using
the Alien Zoo lab
WORKING NATION: ASU’s Dreamscape Learn: How virtual reality is transforming education
In January, ASU plans to launch a course using a virtual immersive experience that it describes as a first of its kind in the industry. ASU partnered with Dreamscape Immersive, the VR entertainment company, to form Dreamscape Learn. And the approach has potential to be applied to all kinds of classrooms as well as adult learners in the workforce.
I caught a preview of Dreamscape Learn at the ASU+GSV Summit in August in San Diego and had a chance to speak to Lisa Flesher and Phil Regier about the learning tool and its potential to transform education.
"If I had this experience in my freshman year, I would have stuck with it more since it would make it easier for me to learn."
“The experience was awesome, and it will change everything on campus if implemented.”
VENTURE BEAT: Virtual Reality is Finally Ready to Revolutionize Education
I had an experience 25 years ago that changed my perspective on computing and education. Back then I was running the early virtual reality (VR) company Immersion Corporation. Immersion developed the first VR simulators for teaching medical students to perform a range of surgical procedures, from inserting needles into the spine to performing laparoscopic surgery, angioplasty, bronchoscopy and colonoscopy.
As CEO, I had to give countless demos at trade shows and other events. After giving a demo of our virtual bronchoscopy system to a group of doctors, one of them asked me where I had gone to medical school. I was confused so he explained that I was quite skilled at the procedure.
VR Biology Lab Experience Leads to Student Success
Students at Arizona State University are learning biology in a unique virtual reality experience, hurtling through space to interact with creatures in an intergalactic wildlife sanctuary the size of a small city and to solve the mystery of why the creatures are dying.
New study shows that students who participated in ASU's Dreamscape Learn lab course performed better and were more engaged. And the data are in to show that the experience is working.
FORBES: How Web3/Ed3 And Immersive Technologies Signal A New Era For K-12 Education
Then there’s the promise of integrating emerging immersive technologies like AR and VR into the curriculum, which Arizona State University is piloting. Dreamscape Learn is a digital educational platform that merges pedagogy and narrative storytelling with fully immersive, avatar-driven virtual reality. ASU is using the technology from Dreamscape Learn for labs in two of its introductory biology classes. The platform gives students the chance to explore problems that reflect the courses’ key concepts—but in a way I could never have imagined.
BIG THINK: How the Metaverse Will Revolutionize K-12 and Higher Education
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There are many things we can teach through books and lectures but giving students highly realistic, “hands-on” experience through a virtual world isn’t one of them.
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On a visit to Dreamscape headquarters, I got to experience immersive worlds, from the human immune system to an ancient ecosystem with dinosaurs.
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This capability to attain first-person perspective is revolutionary in education. It cannot be replicated with flat media.