Week 5: Augmented Reality - Pokémon Go and Zapworks in the Classroom
- annasingle
- Apr 5, 2023
- 2 min read
Updated: Apr 12, 2023
Using Augmented Reality (AR) technology in the classroom enables students to make connections between the digital and physical world around them through visual and interactive experiences (Billinghurst & Dunser, 2012). AR works by combining 3-D objects with real images and videos to enhance the learning experience in real time (Campos-Mesa et al., 2022).

AR technology exists on Milgram et al’s continuum in this position, as it adds to your experience of the physical world through digital enhancements that you can view without a headset as you would for Virtual Reality (VR). There are numerous apps that employ AR technology that people may use for fun, such as Pokémon Go. Using AR technology, the player embodies the role of a trainer and can catch Pokémon using their phone cameras to see and catch them in the real world.
Figure 2: Catching a Pokémon in my living room (Original Author Content, 2023).
Additionally, you can enable Pokémon Go to track your step count even when not using the app, and the distance you walk incubates and hatches your eggs.

Figure 3: Gif of my egg hatching (Original Author Content, 2023).
This feature, as well as new Pokémon emerging in different places, could be employed in a PDHPE or Biology class on a walking activity where students can hatch eggs and catch Pokémon. However, the app does use a lot of data and phone battery, as well as some parents perhaps not being on board with the app tracking their movements to use the step counting features.
An app that students and teachers can employ AR technology in the classroom is Zapworks. Using this, students can engage more deeply with the subject matter and utilise their creativity to create something such as an interactive educational poster. For example, in a History classroom, students can take an image of a historical site or artefact and make it interactive so students can engage with smaller aspects of the site through adding information, or an informative voiceover. This could be as simple as showing a translation of an inscription.

Figure 5: Image when the code is scanned (Original Author Content, 2023).
In creating these layers of information and formats, students can more deeply interact with a site or artefact and develop their understanding of the past in an empathetic manner (Cabero-Almenara et al, 2019). Zapworks has a free trial, and choices for app or web usage of the finished project. There is a bit of a learning curve, but once achieved, it is a very useful tool to promote AR in the humanities classroom.
References
Billinghurst, M. & Dunser, A. (2012). Augmented Reality in the Classroom: What’s real about augmented reality. Computer (Long Beach, Calif.), 45(7), 56–63.
Campos-Mesa, M., Castañeda-Vázquez, C., González-Campos, G., & Delcastillo-Andrés, Ó. (2022). Augmented Reality and the Flipped Classroom— A comparative analysis of university student motivation in semi-presence-based education due to COVID-19: a pilot study. Sustainability (Basel, Switzerland), 14(4), 2319–. https://doi.org/10.3390/su14042319
Campos-Mesa, M., Castañeda-Vázquez, C., González-Campos, G., & Delcastillo-Andrés, Ó. (2022). Augmented Reality and the Flipped Classroom— A comparative analysis of university student motivation in semi-presence-based education due to COVID-19: a pilot study. Sustainability (Basel, Switzerland), 14(4), 2319–. https://doi.org/10.3390/su14042319
Hi, Anna Thanks for writing this post! It was very clear, concise and engaging to read. The brief background knowledge of AR at the beginning of the post was very nice and understandable for readers who may not be well read in the subject of Augmented reality. I would have liked to see some discussion around the disadvantages of AR itself rather than the apps which utilise it. Overall a great read! Thanks. Davis Luo (12/04/2023)