The Living Forest

The Living Forest is a prototype immersive learning environment developed by PublicVR for the "myDome" project (NSF award 0916098) under the leadership of Dr. Annette Schloss at the University of New Hampshire. While it runs on a desktop, it is intended for portable digital dome displays. In the game, the students move through a forest plot during three time periods in the life of the forest and using virtual tools to take measurements. Students record measurements and observations, such as tree species, canopy closure at three time periods, and tree biomass. These items are important for understanding forest dynamics, succession, and the role of forests in climate and the carbon cycle. In the dome, a teacher navigates and leads activities, ususally organizing the students into working groups.

Developing the living forest is part of our larger research agenda to study the interaction between students and virtual worlds in immersive displays. The goal is to understand the particular advantages of sensory immersion for education and its proper role in the larger curriculum.

Credits

Annette Schloss, Ph. D. Principal investigator, general manager, and content expert. Develops requirements for software and curriculum.

Kerry Handron All of the testing and most of the curriculm development.

Jeffrey Jacobson, Ph.D. Both technical and project manager for subcontract to build the forest itself. Helped Handron develop testing procedures and documentation. Analysis of evaluation data.

Kev Nawoichik A bit more than half of the artwork in the latest version of the forest, versions 2.x.x.

Dylan O'Ceallaigh Most of the programming in later versions, 2.x.x and later.