Everyone agrees that making mistakes teaches lessons. But if you’re a teacher, counselor or police officer, making mistakes can have traumatic, if unintentional consequences.
Long a leader in training professionals using virtual reality and digital simulations through the TeachLivE Lab, the University of Central Florida will host a conference June 7-9 for those using the program’s technology to train teachers, nurses, police officers and other professionals whose jobs rely on person-to-person interactions.
For a full description of the TeachLivE Lab, check out the story in UCF’s Pegasus magazine.
TeachLivE uses a mixed-reality teaching environment that allows users to practice scenarios in a safe way. For teachers, they can learn classroom management, for example, with “virtual” students. UCF Police Department uses it to give officers practice in defusing confrontations. Counseling students can use it to learn how to help patients in distress.
The technology is in use at 85 campuses around the world, multiple school districts and companies, said Taylor Bousfield, a LEAD Scholar and UCF doctoral candidate who is coordinating the conference. About 100 people from schools, universities, businesses and agencies will be in attendance, she said.
The conference at UCF’s Teaching Academy is an opportunity to hear from those using TeachLivE talk about their successes and results, she said. And, it’s a great way for those working to enhance the program or find new uses for the technology to present their findings.
“This is a great opportunity for us to show off our campus and to see how something we created has really started the revolution of using simulation in education,” Bousfield said. “It’s an opportunity to bring people from around the world to our campus.”