Page 15 - THE Journal, March/April 2018

REALITY
HECK
WHEN PRESCHOOL students see the lion on the flashcard for the letter “L” come alive and roar, they typically jump back and squeal with delight.
Their reaction isn’t far removed from how educators respond the first time they see this phenomenon, as well. “We were blown away by the technology,” said James
Cupit, an early childhood administrator for the School District of Philadelphia. “We had never seen anything like it.”
The city’s public school system bought a supplemental augmented reality curriculum for teaching early
literacy skills from Alive Studios for 37 of its preschool classrooms. The kit comes with flashcards for each letter of the alphabet, and each letter has a 3D animation associated with it.
When teachers hold the cards under a document camera and move them around, the animations come
to life on a computer screen, bringing 3D learning to students without the need for special glasses.
Students hear the letter sounds as they watch the animation, which taps into different learning modalities and helps the information stick. Alive Studios points
to independent research suggesting 48 percent gains
in letter naming fluency and 112 percent gains in letter sound fluency from using the curriculum.
BY DENNIS PIERCE
MARCH/APRIL 2018 | 15
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Iconic Bestiary; MIRARTI Illustrations/Shutterstock/THE Journal staff