VR and AR Apps For Middle And High School Math.

Today, I'll be sharing some AR and VR apps that are more appropriate for middle school and high school math classes.  Several of them are actually rated for elementary school but can be used in middle school since many students did not get a proper mathematical education over the past couple of years due to the pandemic.  

The first one I explored was Wandermath which was developed by the Entertainment Technology Center at Carnagie Mellon University.  Although it is designed for 4th and 5th graders, it is a very interactive AR program.  The free iPad app comes with three scenarios, the birthday party, the skateboard park and the carnival, and each one focuses on a different skill. 

The Birthday Party has students helping the main character wrap gifts but in the process, students learn how two dimensional nets turn into three dimensional representations of a cube.  The main character talks to the students, explains the process, and waits till the student has finished the project before moving on.  The Skateboard Park has students helping the main character build parts of a skateboard park and focuses on volume.  At the end, the student has created the skateboard park for the main character to use. The last one, the Carnival, has students learn more about cartesian coordinates using water balloons for a fight. There is information for the teacher on each activity.  

Next is something called Fog Stone Island math program put out by Cignition.  It appears to be web based and free.  It is geared for grades four to eight and can be assigned via Google Classroom. This program primarily focuses on fractions from equivalent fractions to adding, subtracting, multiplying, and dividing fractions, to ratios and proportions, to adding and subtracting decimals.  Honestly, it has a three dimensional land where you fly over it and each topic has you going through a video to answer questions to build a well or ranching or farming.  It does provide sample lessons that can be used with certain topics.  This is quite basic but would be good for classes who are missing a foundation on fractions.

The last app I'll look at is Arloon Geometry, an app for both IOS and Android but it does cost money.  It is designed specifically to help students learn more about geometry using AR.  Students begin by choosing a topic - prisms, regular polyhedrons, bodies of revolutions, or pyramids. Once the topic is chosen, the lesson begins which includes a three dimensional representation of a shape and it allows the student to break it down into its net. In addition, it lets the student explore the sides, edges, etc of the shape and provides information, and quizzes them along the way.  I did not try this program because I didn't want to spend the money on it but I tried the other two.

There are a couple of companies out there who offer math programs to districts which utilize VR and AR such as Prism who offers an algebra course for grades 4 to 12. Another is Classvr who offer Mathematical resources but I have no idea how much they cost for their products.  I tend to stay away from companies and prefer to use apps and software but there really aren't that many available for the upper grades.  I'll revisit this topic later.  Let me know what you think, I'd love to hear.  Have a great day.