Immersion, experience and understanding: virtual theatres in drama teaching

Abstract

In academic teaching on drama and theatre history knowledge about theatre rooms and spatial aspects of the theatre has traditionally been conveyed through lectures, slide-shows and books. Communication tends to be one-way. The active participation of students is limited. In this project we developed virtual tools and working methods to give students the opportunity to try stage solutions in historical theatres and to build their own three-dimensional theatres. The virtual world in the computers becomes a laboratory where students learn actively by experimenting and building themselves and by reflecting on processes and results. A general aim of the project is to reduce one-way communication from teacher to student and to promote a student-centred learning process.