The Metaverse—An Alternative Education Space

Introduction

During the worldwide abrupt pivot to online teaching and learning in March of 2020, students, parents, teachers, and administrators reluctantly jumped into a “safety net” of online teaching and learning mandated by a society in lockdown. The viral contagion at hand, Covid-19, caused global morbidity and mortality [1, 2] to those in proximity with infected individuals. The Latin root of the word contagion hails from contagio meaning “from touch.” Touching and breathing in the same physical space as others became deadly, necessitating a worldwide quarantine. The education community scrambled to enact video-based platforms such as Zoom, Microsoft Teams, and Google Meet to retrofit the classroom into a business-meeting paradigm for students and teachers sequestered at home. The default to solely online content delivery sought to substitute, but could never replace, the collaborative teaching and learning embraced by educators with their students.

According to the Pew Research Organization [3], the United States public is divided regarding closure of K—12 schools for face-to-face learning. When the return to live-distanced learning occurred at various timeframes across the United States, administrators, teachers, and school staff resorted to a dizzying puzzle of measures including face masks, desk shields, and staggered in-person schedules to meet physical distance, health, and safety recommendations [4].

In their timely book regarding the Psychiatry of Pandemics, Duan et al. (2019) shed light on much of what society observed during the Covid-19 pandemic. Duan and colleagues (2019) explain that contagion theory is a collective behavior that delineates how a crowd can have an impact on the emotions and behavior of an individual [5] . Originally developed by Gustave Le Bon in 1885, contagion theory asserts that individual behavior is “demoted” to the level of the one group member who is most outspoken (p. 45) [6]. Duan and colleagues (2019) assert that this mass behavior is both unconscious on the part of the individual and uncontrollable. Largely fueled by social media, false information regarding Covid-19 including mask, vaccination, testing, and social distance mandates, undermine public health and pose dangers to individuals making health decisions [7]. The global nature and spread of new variants compelled one international student residing in Asia to share the following with the author of this paper:

School districts in the United States also experienced the contagion of behaviors by members who attempt to cope with the Covid – 19 virus and its variants. The “home rules” in both lower and upper socioeconomic status (SES) contexts might include students and families sequestered at home who do not want to share the private space of their living quarters during online classes in lockdown. Students might choose to turn off their video camera to play games or watch movies on their devices. The purpose of documenting the following shared experience of three teachers in separate contexts is to illustrate the breakdown of the collaborative teaching and learning environment that ensues when an educator is not in the same space as their students.

A male middle-school science teacher in an urban, low SES demographic in the Northeast United States shared what he calls the diffusion of responsibility that he establishes successfully in face-to-face environments that breaks down during solely online classes. He asserts that he and his students share a rapport and commitment by being in the same “space” to achieve the day’s learning goals. This diffusion of responsibility crumbles when all his students are locked down in their respective homes during his Google Meet online classes. Some students refuse to put on their video cameras. Once a dominant group member refuses to use their video camera, then a domino effect ensues when most students decline to use their video camera (Anonymous Science Teacher, Northeast U.S. Urban Context, February 22, 2022).

A female high school math teacher in an urban, upper SES demographic in the Northeast United States echoed this sentiment. After her school district experienced frequent Zoom bombing, defined as the disruptive behavior by a predominantly uninvited attendee, the district pivoted again to a second platform for online content delivery. Google Meet shelters its community within the password-protected Google Classroom. She shared that most students refuse to turn on their video cameras on both Zoom and Google Meet, forming a disconnect between the teacher and her students whose “home rules” rather than “classroom rules” are in force. Not being in the same physical space limits her ability to refocus students’ attention on learning goals (Anonymous Math Teacher, Northeast U.S. Urban Context, February 21, 2022).

A female middle school STEM teacher in an urban, middle class SES demographic in the Southeast United States shared that she requires students to turn on their video camera during online classes. If a student claims technical difficulties, she places them into the Zoom waiting room. She resolves the “technical” issue by enlisting the help of a parent or guardian. The teacher explained that this procedure is to maintain her rapport with over 100 students to be fair to those who attend with their camera on. She indicated that, out of all her students, only one genuinely required an additional WiFi hotspot provided by the district to the family to improve connectivity. Further sequestering a student into a waiting room fragments an already fragile classroom ecosystem.

If students are “off-task” during online classes mandated by the lockdown, then what are they doing? One possible answer is a space where most students already reside, the Metaverse, a collection of virtual worlds. To call virtual worlds such as Roblox and Minecraft “just games” is to downplay engaging environments that serve as a lifeline to connect with friends and engage in creativity and learning. Roblox is a free virtual platform dominated by children, ages 5 through 12, who spawn virtual characters to attend English classes, with interactive spelling tests, in a castle-like space such as Royale High [8]. Minecraft is a virtual world where students can engage in building a “sandbox,” open-ended world through geometry and creativity [9]. A student in the male science teacher’s class mentioned above (Anonymous Science Teacher, Northeast U.S. Urban Context, February 22, 2022) made a connection between the rocks studied during class and the rocks the student used in Minecraft to build structures [10] in the Metaverse.

The examples of Roblox and Minecraft are not meant to suggest that the education community should replace content with existing virtual spaces. There are virtual world platforms to consider as places to conduct classes such that educators can be in the same space again with their students in a hybrid approach to teaching and learning. Strictly virtual worlds will never replace face-to-face learning. However, the Metaverse merits examination as a space where teachers and students can co-exist in a hybrid approach to teaching and learning.

The remainder of this paper defines and examines the Metaverse as a virtual environment that the education community can harness as a component of teaching and learning. Universal Design for Learning (UDL) serves as the framework of this paper to draw connections between teaching and learning with the Metaverse. The following UDL paradigms (see figure 1) align with the networks of the human brain that support learning:

• The “why” of learning aligns with the affective networks to engage, challenge, and motivate.

• The “what” of learning aligns with the recognition networks by perceiving information in the environment through multiple senses.

• The “how” of learning aligns with the strategic networks to plan and perform tasks to exhibit understanding.

The metaverse

Neal Stephenson coined the term Metaverse in his 1992 novel Snow Crash, where his main character, Hiro Protagonist, spends a great deal of time to escape his living quarters in a U-Stor-It unit in Los Angeles during the 21st century. Stephenson [11] describes the Metaverse as follows:

Within the Metaverse, individuals reinvent themselves and can enhance their appearance, clothing, or even species such as a gorilla or an imaginary dragon. The avatars represent real people residing in any location on the internet. Stephenson [11] explains the avatars that Hiro sees in the Metaverse as:

Platforms such as Roblox and Minecraft are computer-generated metaverse spaces. Individuals can choose existing “player” templates [12, 13] or design a custom 3D character “skin” on websites such as Minecraft Skins [14]. Roblox offers free options to select body attributes, including skin tone, costumes, clothing, accessories, and animations [15]. According to the Roblox terms of use agreement [16], individuals 18 or older can acquire Robux to enhance their avatar with attributes offered for purchase. This author created an account and avatar depicted in figure 2.

This article will utilize Bitmoji [17] as an example of a tool to create customizable avatars (see figure 3) to discuss Metaverse platforms that educators can implement with their students residing in the same space to support teaching and learning.

As indicated in the introduction of this article, the worldwide education community defaulted to online meeting platforms such as Zoom, Google Meet, and Microsoft Teams to facilitate online classes with their students in lockdown. While the internet hosts the online meetings, these platforms are not the Metaverse. Immersive views (see figure 4) selected by the host of the online meeting account still situates the attendees in one spot, limiting their freedom of movement. Attendees can upload a profile picture to display when they choose to turn off their video, however, it is frequently a parent’s image when the student uses a home account, or a school logo when the attendee uses an institution-issued device.

Skeuomorphism

Skeuomorphism is a user experience (UX) design concept that incorporates objects and environments that resemble the real world. Mobile and computer device users frequently see examples of skeuomorphism when they drag a file to a folder icon to organize documents or click the image of a retro floppy disk to save files [18]. There are skeuomorphic, online platforms that lend themselves to the creation of a customized Metaverse where educators can sustain the illusion of being in the same physical space as their students.

This paper will use Teamflow [19], a skeuomorphic online platform that provides furniture, layouts, backgrounds, audio zones, collaboration tools, and options to upload images of real-world objects to customize the Metaverse. The Metaverse created by this author (see video 1) provides students with the opportunity to join her in an imagined colony on the Moon where they will collaborate on experiments to sustain life and manufacture items. For this unit, the students use Bitmoji to create a customized avatar to upload to their Teamflow member profile. The avatar appears in a circle medallion that reveals when the student turns off their video camera. While in this Metaverse, students can mute or unmute their audio as needed. Most importantly, the student can move their medallion around the space to either collaborate with classmates on an assignment within an audio space designated for that purpose or to use a “portal” to another “room”. For purposes of this example, this Metaverse begins with the arrival of students on the Moon imagined through an uploaded background of craters. The teacher greets students and then invites them to sit in one of two chairs to “teleport” to one of two rooms (see figure 5). One room is the Artemis Headquarters (see figure 6), a Metaverse space that can accommodate up to 100 students. The microphone UX object placed at the podium allows the teacher to broadcast their voice to everyone at the Headquarters. Teamflow includes tools that the educator can use to create multiple whiteboards, share their screen, or “app smash (embed)” a link into the Metaverse that creates a window of content such as a YouTube video. The second room where students could teleport when they arrive at the Moon Metaverse is the laboratory (see figure 7). Furnished with a user-uploaded lab station and tables, the students can collaborate on an assigned task. The teacher can send a message to members in any space, including a Tinkercad 3D Design Room, a Visual Arts Room, a Formative Feedback Room, and a Gallery Walk to showcase projects (see video 1).

With the Moon Metaverse established as an example of shared space among educators and their students represented by medallions that contain their avatars and audio capabilities, this paper will examine the aspects of Universal Design for Learning supported by Metaverse spaces.

Universal Design for Learning

In 1984, the Center for Applied Special Technology (CAST), located in Wakefield MA, developed Universal Design for Learning (UDL) in response to their work with hospitalized children in a multidisciplinary clinic that assessed how these students with learning issues could be better served [20].

CAST [20] sought to:

• empower students by scaffolding areas of weakness

• focus on amplifying students’ abilities by giving them the technology tools in an asset versus deficit approach

• provide assessment choices to a child to create something visual through technology. For example, a student referred to CAST with a diagnosis of dyslexia versus amplifying her abilities to express herself in other formats, such exhibiting their learning through artwork.

• level the playing field for the students

• help teachers better serve students

The directors of CAST, Anne Meyer, David Rose, and David Gordon realized that all the students, regardless of ability, could benefit from equal access to course materials and resources. The CAST directors concluded that it was the curriculum, and not the learners, that posed the problem. Curriculum in schools can be a series of unnecessary barriers to learning through traditional, single-entry-point printed text and fill-in-the-bubble multiple choice assessment approaches. The UDL approach dispels the myth of the average student and provides multiple entry points for engagement, representation, action, and expression [21].

The Why of Learning

Students’ emotional response to become engaged in learning, sustain motivation, and foster their volition reside in the affective, “Why of Learning “networks of the brain [21]. Motivation is a student’s desire to accept responsibility for a task and sustain effort [22]. Volition moves beyond motivation to overcome perceived obstacles, barriers, and hindrances in the learning process [22]. Research also links volition to transformative learning that is discovery and curiosity-based [23], and linked to inspiration evoked by something in a student’s environment [24].

The Moon Colony Metaspace offered as an example to support teaching and learning (see video 1) provides an intriguing environment that aligns with students’ established citizenship in the Metaverse. One of the tenets of the affective network of learning is to optimize relevance according to Meyer and colleagues [21]. The Moon Colony aligns with platforms relevant to students’ activities outside of school where they can collaborate and, most importantly, exercise choice in activities. Educators who build the UDL “why” of learning into their curriculum can partner with students to sustain and inspire students with the goal of fostering expert learners who are purposeful, motivated, and lean into volition (see table 1).

5.1.

The What of Learning

The “What” of learning engages the recognition networks of the brain that permit us to recognize voices, faces, letters, words, and complex patterns [21]. In the Moon Colony Metaverse, teachers can “app smash” other applications into each room to incorporate any addressable resource, such as a Google Document, Slides, Form, etc. directly into the “room” for students to access (see video 1). What flexible design formats are under educators’ control to provide multiple entry points for all students? Teachers should design assignment documents and supporting materials, that they can enact in hybrid learning environments, in fonts, and high contrast font to backgrounds colors that most readers can see [30]. For instance, sans serif fonts such as Arial or Helvetica, without curls or flourishes at the end of the letters, are the most “readable” by all viewers. A high contrast background to font color is best such that readers can easily decipher words from the background [31].

Teachers can embed Mote audio notes into documents as images linked to the URL of Mote [32] note. Click on this Mote logo, then click play button that appears in your browser window. Alternatively, read the QR code in figure 11 with the camera of your mobile device to hear the recorded message.

Teachers can provide video instructions regarding assignments on platforms such as Flipgrid to increase their social presence. Flipgrid provides QR codes for each post. Download the QR code and paste it into your assignment as an image. Alternatively, provide a blue link to click the Flipgrid to provide instructions to learners who prefer verbal instructions. By providing text, audio, and video on each of the materials provided to students, the teacher can fine-tune the accessibility in the “what” of learning (see figure 12).

5.2.

The How of Learning

The “How” of learning provides students with multiple means of action and expression [21]. As exhibited in table 1, student choice is evident to assist students in the persistence of their motivation to take responsibility for tasks and to choose learning paths to work around perceived obstacles or barriers. The “app smashed” Pictochart and Thinglink projects, showcased in the Gallery Walk (see figure 13), provide evidence of the multiple entry points for students to exhibit learning.

Conclusion

Authors of the literature regarding the Metaverse, from its inception as a concept in Stevenson’s Snow Crash to the Kye et al. [40] updates to the Multiverse Roadmap, wrote about this 3D environment predominantly from the comfort of a pre-pandemic world. The authors and their stakeholders could safely toggle between face-to-face, hybrid, and online environments without the worry of a deadly contagion. Metaverse platforms such as Teamflow offer teachers and their students with an opportunity to safely collaborate in an environment that permits unique identities in the form of avatars who can free themselves from business meeting platforms such as Zoom, Teams, and Google Meet to collaborate a customizable environment to support learning objectives and outcomes. Incorporating the Metaverse into as a shared learning adopts a world where students already reside, collaborate, and thrive.

Data availability

Data analyzed within a literature review.

Conflicts of interest

There are no financial or non-financial conflicts of interest/competing interests regarding this chapter. The researcher does not have financial interest or benefit arising from the direct applications of the research.