OES is bringing the next generation of virtual reality learning to higher education, through an exclusive partnership with global VR leaders, Talespin.
A groundbreaking development for the sector, the new partnership means universities will – via seamless LMS integration – be able to teach sought-after skills using highly customised, emotionally realistic immersive learning experiences. Performance scoring and accurate, streamlined assessment are all built into the tool.
Realising the potential of VR immersive learning experiences
In business and industry worldwide, VR immersive learning has exploded as an effective, engaging and scalable learning solution. Fully customisable, it’s being harnessed to upskill employees in areas such as communication, leadership, people management and diversity training.
In translating VR immersive learning to higher education, OES is pioneering the development of these simulations with a specific focus on curriculum integration and assessment.
Together with Talespin, OES’s VR immersive learning experiences will provide students with a safe place to practice vital workplace skills and receive real-time feedback. Offering unrivalled scalability, each simulated learning experience can be accessed multiple times.
More engaging, impactful learning
A recent PwC research project conducted in partnership with Talespin highlights the power of VR immersive learning. The research – the largest ever study of enterprise VR soft skills – compared outcomes for those learning in a classroom, via e-learning and through VR immersive learning.
The results were compelling. The study’s VR learners learned skills four times faster than those in the classroom and 1.5 times faster than e-learners. VR learners also felt 275% more confident to apply what they learned.
“VR learners felt 3.75 times more emotionally connected to content than classroom learners and 2.3 times more emotionally connected to content than e-learners. These are powerful results that underscore the potential of VR immersive learning to deliver the skill acquisition universities aim for in terms of producing capable, work-ready graduates,” said Talespin’s General Manager APAC, Joe Millward.
“In terms of authentic environment and scalability, we believe Talespin serves as a leading solution to enhance learning in the higher education space,” says Talespin’s Joe Millward
“For universities, OES’s learning design expertise and best-in-class user experience will combine with Talespin’s proprietary platform to deliver AI- and VR-powered asynchronous experiential learning. It’s taking virtual reality training to a whole new level.”
Meeting the challenge of workforce skill development at scale
Employers increasingly demand graduates with ready-to-go workforce skills such as communication, leadership, conflict resolution, performance management, problem solving and analysis.
“We hear from our university partners that teaching and assessing these skills at scale can be a challenge,” says OES Simulation Services Lead, Cara Burgio. “Now, OES is uniquely positioned to support universities to meet the demand with a proven solution.”
With realistic virtual environments and industry expertise in online pedagogy, the VR modules offered by OES in partnership with Talespin offer a learner-centric, immersive experience. Assessment can be streamlined through in-built performance scoring that assigns a numerical value to measure the use of soft skills. This is calculated as the learner engages in a complex, narrative-driven simulation where they converse with AI human avatars, which respond based on their decision making. At the conclusion of a simulation, educators can access performance dashboards to track their students’ results.
“Simulated scenarios can be as complex or as simple as the university requires. Once designed and delivered to our partner, they can re-used again and again, across numerous cohorts,” says Cara.
What is Talespin?
Talespin is an innovative and immersive content platform, supported by an authoring tool that enables the creation of bespoke conversational learning content. The platform’s emotionally realistic immersive learning experiences see learners engage in a realistic role play with virtual human characters.
“In terms of authentic environment and scalability, we believe there is no genuine competitor for Talespin in the higher education space,” says Talespin’s Joe Millward.
“For universities, OES’s learning design expertise and best-in-class user experience will combine with Talespin’s proprietary platform to deliver AI- and VR-powered asynchronous experiential learning. It’s taking virtual reality training to a whole new level.”
Talespin and OES in Australia
OES will service clients with both Talespin off-the-shelf library content and bespoke simulation builds. The partnership will enable OES to create localised content for Australian learners as well as service global cohorts. OES’s Talespin library will showcase Australian voices and reflect the Australian context in our tailor-made simulation services.
As with all OES learning design, our expert team will harness the Talespin content authoring tool to meet our partners’ learning objectives. OES’s Cara Burgio explains:
“Our learning designers will work closely with university SMEs to design pathways that reflect the skills they want to see and the learning objectives they want to measure. Learning in AI-guided simulations is personalised and iterative, as students are given the opportunity to correct their responses by observing how the virtual human reacts to their dialogue choices or retake the simulation multiple times to demonstrate improvement or mastery of a skill.”
Students receive detailed feedback at the end of their simulation. And importantly, academic staff have easy access to performance and engagement data for individual students and entire cohorts.
The partnership follows several successful pilot projects for OES partner universities, where we explored and tested Talespin’s capabilities for skill acquisition in fields such as pre-service teaching.
