English, Secondary Education

Teachers have been asked to do virtually everything—plan fantastic educational lessons, manage behavior, use technologies to engage and promote learning, assess and report to stakeholders, build strong relation-ships, advocate for students, keep family secrets, and more. However, as technologies have progressed and become more widely available, and as the COVID-19 pandemic set in, teachers are now being asked to do everything, virtually. This book was born from this shift in paradigms. It is both story and vision, and it is about how English language arts (ELA) teachers are learning to do everything virtually—through virtual and augmented reality technologies. This book is offered as a preliminary guide and resource to the emerging possibilities of VR/AR. The chapters here explore the use of VR/AR in secondary ELA classrooms and provide a roadmap for those who want to understand VR/AR better, as well as see concrete examples of how these technologies have been used in ELA classrooms. The book is divided into three sections: The first section begins with an overview of previous research and offers readers ways to conceptualize the use of VR/AR in ELA teaching. The second section contains examples of practical uses of VR/AR in traditional classrooms through literature teaching, virtual field trips, and the use of VR goggles to promote writing development. The third part of the book focuses on interdisciplinary work in ELA teaching. Topics include geolocation and bomb-making. After all, ELA is a discipline that can accommodate interdisciplinary integration well (Davis, 1999).

ISBN 9781793629852 (Cloth : acid-free paper) | ISBN 9781793629869 (eBook)