A chemistry laboratory platform enhanced with virtual reality for students’ adaptive learning

Abstract

In recent years, virtual reality system (VRS) has become more prominent among many researchers due to its capacity of providing as close as possible to real-life experience for users from diverse fields of life, such as tourism, academics, manufacturing and medicine. In this study, we present an VRS for the titration experiment in a chemistry laboratory to enable students to learn the titration experiment in a virtual laboratory environment before proceeding to the chemistry wet lab. The virtual chemistry laboratory environment was developed using the Unity Real-Time Development Platform, and the Microsoft SQL Server was used for the database to enable easy assessment of the student performance after the experiment. To evaluate our VRS, we tested it among 50 students (25 high school and 25 first-year undergraduate chemistry students). We collate their user’s experience through a structured questionnaire, and the responses from the students show that 60% agreed that it was helpful, 66% easy to interact with and 54% strongly agreed that it improved learning. Therefore, it is evidence that the proposed VR-enabled chemistry laboratory platform could be used to improve the understanding of chemistry titration practical process among students.

Augmented Reality, a Review of a Way to Represent and Manipulate 3D Chemical Structures

“… 4 Other research showed improvements in learning outcomes 70 and understanding in practical chemistry classes. 71 In spite of these discrepancies, all these features together justify the growing use of AR in education and research.…”

VR in chemistry, a review of scientific research on advanced atomic/molecular visualization

“…Some articles reviewed VL APPs for use in Biology, Biotechnology and Chemistry classes, and although they reaffirm that VL must not substitute the real experience lab work, the advantages are best seen when VL is combined with traditional lab practices as they indicate good general cognitive effects in the development of skills and motivation (Cataldi and Dominighini, 2018;Sypsas and Kalles, 2018). Comparatively with the same amount of training time, there is a large increase in student achievement when the traditional methodology is combined with the virtual laboratory and tutoring led by the teacher (Agbonifo et al, 2020).…”

Mobile Augmented Reality Laboratory for Learning Acid–Base Titration

“…2−9 Specifically for training laboratory skills in titration, VR scenarios have been developed and tested. 10,11 These studies suggest that virtual environments can enhance the learners' confidence when performing chemical experiments, and they can serve as pretraining for real laboratory practice. Similarly, Tee et al 12 have shown that students could also gain confidence when performing experiments using a markerbased AR titration tool.…”

“…Emerging technologies, such as virtual reality (VR) and augmented reality (AR), have provided alternative hands-on experience in recent years. In chemical education, both AR and VR have been used to support diverse learning activities. − Specifically for training laboratory skills in titration, VR scenarios have been developed and tested. , These studies suggest that virtual environments can enhance the learners’ confidence when performing chemical experiments, and they can serve as pretraining for real laboratory practice. Similarly, Tee et al have shown that students could also gain confidence when performing experiments using a marker-based AR titration tool.…”