Harnessing the Power of Virtual Reality Experiences as Social Situation of Development to Enrich the Professional Experiences of Early Childhood Pre-Service Teachers

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

This is a novel and interesting approach for teachers to practice interactions with children. It was interesting to learn more about the virtual interactions drawing from your theoretical framework based on SSD.

The manuscript would benefit from additional precisions in the methodology section and the findings section. Overall, more substantiation of the qualitative findings should be created by sharing more raw data. Details and explanations are required to provide a more coherent sense of the virtual setting, the children's roles, and the types of interaction.

Please find below detailed suggestions for improvement:

Abstract: The abstract needs to be edited for clarity and grammatical accuracy. Upper-case "This", line 8. "PST" abbreviation has not been introduced, line 17. Verb missing in a sentence fragment, lines 17-18.

Knowledge*s, line 46 (never seen the plural form)

Research question, lines 87-88: auxiliary "do" is missing.

Citation: Vygotsky (1997): Secondary source.
Consider adding a reference to the translation (1978) of the primary source (1930-34): Vygotsky (1978). Mind in society: The development of higher psychological processes Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press.

Theoretical framework: lines 97-98: "we developed a theoretical framework based on cultural-historical theory".
To increase clarity, it would be useful to add a chart or table to clarify the main components or pillars of this framework. This chart could also include the D-SSD framework, line 160 to provide a richer understanding of what the framework entails exactly.
(Alternatively, a visual illustration of the D-marks might provide an example of the data analysis procedures).

Methodology:

Sample selection: Primarily international students (line 129): How were the participants selected? No details about the selection process or the participants are provided, other than the sample size.

Duration: see lines 130-135. Please clarify: "10-day placement, delivering 20-minute teaching sessions via Zoom to five avatar children."
What was the total duration of the interaction with the avatar children for each participant? 

Prompts for reflection: How were they developed and with which concepts in mind? They seem very open and it is not immediately clear which experiences the researchers are trying to tap, namely, "What works for you in the VR teaching session? What did not work in the session? What other reflections you would like to share with peers?"

For better clarity, use "avatar children", not "children". See line 131: "with children aged 3 to 5 years."
Although it is unclear to me whether both were involved, see lines 163-164: "the interactions between pre-service teachers (PSTs), avatars, and children in the VR experience"

Avatar children: Please specify: "each with distinct personalities and behaviours", line 135

Typeset: 142-143: Different font size. Deliberate?

Decision-making process: How was that one participant selected? Lines 152-153: "specifically analysed one participant’s observations about the benefits and challenges of using VR technology during these experiences."

Date collection: How many units of analysis were subject to qualitative data analysis? If a software was used to facilitate qualitative data analysis, please indicate.

Findings: The verbatim quotes are very helpful in creating an idea of the VR setting.
It would be helpful to include a transcript, or excerpt thereof, to read an interaction between the teacher and the avatar child. What did the children's communications look like.

Substantiate the findings: lines 220-221, "we encouraged them to explain ‘why,’ promoting independent thinking and better articulation":
Please provide examples of the avatar children's contributions.

It is still unclear to me if the avatar children were operated by children or if they were operated by adults or if they were (pre-trained) "chatbots".

Line 307 makes me think that the avatars were operated by a human. Is this a correct interpretation? I am referring to "Some [avatar] children may have felt tired and kept their heads down."

Line 257: "Mursion" was not introduced before. What is it?
(From the website https://blog.aare.edu.au/virtual-reality-we-wanted-to-future-proof-our-students-heres-what-we-did/, we can learn what Mursion is, but it should definitely be introduced in the introduction.)

Author Response

Please see the attached document for our responses to reviewer 1's comments. We have highlighted our responses in yellow in the revised manuscript. Thank you.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 2 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

Dear Authors

I appreciate the opportunity to review the selected article. I consider it a very important issue for teacher professional development applying virtual reality. In addition, it is far from the classic ways of doing educational research. Here are some observations:

Abstract: Present the study in an appropriate way; it is direct and makes clear the intention to achieve with the study and with the vicissitudes. However, to the extent possible, it would be pertinent to explain or discuss in a synthetic way some limitations.

Introduction

It presents the theoretical development very well and adequately addresses the aspects related to teacher training. However, we consider it important to talk a little about professional competencies and the type of procedural competencies that need to be developed. Regarding the formal aspects of the writing, however, taking into account that it is being written in APA format, the order of the authors Dieker et al, who should go after Cross et al and not before, should be corrected, that is in the following quote (Dieker et al., 2014; Cross et al., 2022; Lindberg & Jönsson, 2023; Sasaki et al., 2020) (line 65-66).

Theoretical framework and methods

Then, in the theoretical framework and methods, Ma (2020) is cited in the same paragraph, in lines 121 and 123, respectively. According to the APA standard this is not adequate. Being from the same paragraph, it could be quoted only once. In addition, due to copyright, it is advisable to cite and reference the company Zoom (line 134). Furthermore, they need to explain some criteria for developing the virtual classroom and avatars. They must explain the instruments for collecting opinions from the participants.

Data analysis

This section could explain the process of the analyses in more detail. It synthesizes the levels of interpretation (common sense, situated practice, and thematic analysis), but more accurate information is needed regarding the analyses themselves, whether or not any software was applied to analyses the data. From the findings in section 4.1 it appears to be of qualitative analysis, but it is not clear how the opinions of the participants were analyzed. Moreover, explain how the rigor or veracity of the answers was controlled. Requires a better presentation or synthesis of the opinions or progress of the 66 participants.

Findings

They are presented in a very direct way, the sequence of how the results are organized is not explained. On the other hand, due to the way the article is presented, it should have a logic similar to qualitative studies in education. In other words, the results and the discussion go together. Usually there are answers or verbatim phrases said by the participants themselves, which will then be discussed. Or qualitative analysis graphs are presented where the answers are synthesized (without using statistics); and then discussed.

Discussion

The discussion needs better development; it is not enough to reinforce the results with quotations; it is also necessary to question them with other citations, indicate whether or not they coincide with other similar studies, and explain the reason for the coincidence. At the same time, it is important to express some subjectivity or bias. For example, if they perceived security because they were avatars and not normal children, they felt more free to act. It is necessary to explain these aspects. Regarding the APA standards, it is not necessary to replace some complete terms in some, on line 245 they must continue to use the acronym "Preservice teachers (PSTs) recognize the invaluable benefits of virtual reality (VR)". Lines 270 and 271 show the following: (Ma, 2020; Vygotsky, 1998; Veresov, 2019; Veresov et al., 2024). Vygotsky must go to the end. In addition, the discussion should explain some limitations and possible biases of the study.

I suggest that the authors make a thorough review and correct the suggested aspects.

Kind regards.

Author Response

Please see the attached document for our responses to reviewer 2's comments. We have highlighted our responses in yellow in the revised manuscript. Thank you.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Round 2

Reviewer 1 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

Dear authors, thank you very much for your carefully crafted revision. All comments and questions have been answered in full. Thank you for providing specific details, especially in the methodology section, which was extremely helpful and clarified all of the questions that I had about the study and the way it was executed.

Thank you again. It was a pleasure reading your manuscript.

Reviewer 2 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

Dear Authors,

Significant improvements are observed in the writing of the article.

1. However, there are minor observations. For example, academic writing is impersonal, so the word "She" on line 144 could be replaced with "In addition."
2. Then, consider that Figure 2 should be presented as a table.
3. In addition, it would be prudent to make a general revision of the wording because in line 389 there is a capital letter later that should not go. This is seen in the following sentence "Additionally, While...".

After that, I consider that the article is well developed.