Enhancing Student Engagement & Inclusivity with AR & VR for Students with Intellectual Disabilities

Over the course of the hour long presentation, participants will learn the basics of how augmented and virtual reality works, the terms and definitions, the themes and opportunities of integrating these technologies into classrooms, and the learning how they can help students with intellectual disabilities or the neurodiverse student in learning life and occupational skills.

This presentation is the beginning of the culmination of my doctoral research in studying the impact of augmented and virtual reality on students with intellectual disabilities in learning life and occupational skills. After a thorough review of the existing literature, it has been discovered that there are very few research studies that have been written about these immersive technologies for this population of students. While this area of research is expanding every day with the constant invention of new applications in this field, studies into the effectiveness of using these technologies to improve or acquire life and vocational skills for students with intellectual disabilities are only recently being written, and further research on their impact needs to be completed.

Several platforms and Apps will be discussed that enable both Augmented Reality and Virtual Reality to work.