Extended Reality in Education

Dear Colleagues,

The use of extended reality (XR) applications and tools encompassing virtual reality (VR), augmented reality (AR), and mixed reality (MR) is perceived as a technological innovation that can enhance the design and orchestration of teaching and learning. From interactive 3D learning content, game-like quests, avatar-based interactions, and multimodal learning activities to immersive and highly personalized assessment representations, XR can have a powerful effect in constructive and self-regulated learning that is premised on creativity, collaboration, participation, games, and play. The deeply immersive nature of XR accommodates a gamut of senses including sight, sound, smell, taste, pressure, heat, and texture, which resemble the effects of real experiences that can enhance the authenticity of the learning and strengthen the formation of learning communities and collaborative ecosystems that support situated and contextual learning through exerting emotions and through leveraging the principles of transmedia learning for creating stories and scenarios across experiences and devices. However, the integration of XR in education poses a set of challenges, such as the need to instigate multidisciplinary approaches to involving educators, game designers, developers, and researchers in designing XR-based learning activities that take full advantage of the affordances that XR applications and tools can offer. Secondly, the empirical evaluation of XR interventions in education is key to determine the effectiveness and impact on designing XR-based learning outcomes, assessment, and feedback. Lastly, teachers’ skills and competencies needed to design and enact XR-based learning and learning are key, along with ethical considerations surrounding data privacy, student safety, and accessibility. This Special Issue aims to explore issues surrounding the use of XR for designing and enacting learning and teaching across educational sectors (primary, secondary, tertiary, vocational) including XR games and serious games, in both analogue and digital formats.

Topics of interest include but are not limited to the following:

• XR and its substrates AR, VR, and MR for designing and orchestrating learning activities, assessment, and feedback;
• Learning design for XR including pedagogy, learning sequences, outcomes, and frameworks;
• Development, implementation, and evaluation of XR prototypes including XR games and serious games in terms of learning efficiency, usability, and user experience;
• XR and games for skills, capability, and competency development;
• Accessibility and inclusivity in XR education for equitable access in diverse educational contexts including students with disabilities;
• Assessment and evaluation of learning content, cognitive processes, emotion, engagement, interaction, and motivation levels;
• XR for multidisciplinary and transmedia learning;
• XR simulations for professional training in fields such as STEM, health, architecture, and other vocational areas;

Dr. Petros Lameras
Prof. Dr. Sylvester Arnab
Prof. Dr. Sara de Freitas
Dr. Panagiotis Petridis
Guest Editors

Manuscript Submission Information

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Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a double-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Education Sciences is an international peer-reviewed open access monthly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 1800 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

• XR, VR, AR, MR in education
• games
• game-based learning
• gamification
• immersion
• creativity
• critical thinking
• ethics
• evaluation and assessment