Aurasma
Aurasma is an Augmented Reality app. Augmented Reality allows you to embed media onto real physical objects. Just as scanning a QR code with an app takes you to a particular website, scanning an object or image with an AR app like Aurasma can take the viewer to particular media or links. Aurasma calls these linked images Auras. Within the app, you can view Auras, find existing Auras on a map, or create your own!
The best things about Aurasma
- Auras are highly engaging. Students get to interact with physical objects through multimedia, which is very unique!
- Making an Aura is easy and quick.
- Accessing Auras is as simple as opening the app and pointing your camera toward the object. Because they're so quick to access, students could view a number of Auras in a short amount of time.
- You can search through Auras to find pre-existing ones that you can utilize with your students.
- Auras allow students to share videos they create in a fun way.
The constraints of Aurasma
- There are very few pre-existing Auras, so you'll likely need to create any Aura you want to share.
- You have to keep your device steadily pointed at the object to continue the Aura, and you have to hold it rather steadily if you have text on the screen you need to read.
- You can't pull from the web for Overlays, so you can't use YouTube videos (unless you download them to your device), animations you find, or images you haven't downloaded to your device.
- Auras have to be public and searchable in order for anyone else to see them, which means all student videos and images will have to be made public. This can be difficult if you want to avoid using student faces in the videos.
How to use Aurasma
Original artifact made with Aurasma
The best way to view this artifact is to download the Aurasma app, open it, and direct your device to the book Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets by J.K. Rowling. You can also watch the video below of someone else doing just that.
How students can use Aurasma
- Book Trailers - Aurasma is a great way to publish book reviews and trailers. Students could create book trailer or book review videos about a book they read. You could then create a classroom or media center display of books that have Auras linked to them. Other students in the class or the school could use their devices to learn more about the books in the display by watching the video Overlays attached to the books.
- Living Maps - Students could create videos about historical events, and use those as Overlays for maps of the regions where the events occurred, tying together the history and the geography.
- Object poems - Students could create object poems, create videos for their poems, then create Auras with those Overlays attached to the objects they wrote about.
- Equation applications - Students could find or create images of math applications in action, then Overlay those over equations to create Auras. For instance, a students could take a picture of a jump in Angry Birds (parabola) and Overlay that over a quadratic equation. They could also create Auras from equations by graphing the answers and taking pictures of the graphs.
- Simple Machines in Real Life - Students could record videos of simple machines in action, and use them as Overlays on simpe drawings of simple machines. For instance, a group could draw a simple lever, then take a picture of a seesaw at a park to attach to the drawing to create their Aura.
How teachers can use Aurasma
- Scavenger Hunts - Aurasma is perfect for creating scavenger hunts! Teachers could create a scavenger hunt with clues that lead to particular objects, then those Auras could give the clue for the next object. They could also be randomly searched out by students by attaching Auras to objects that have a specific theme or tie to the lesson in some significant way.
- Review - Teachers could use Aurasma to review any content. Students could be given questions or clues that lead them to a particular object that represents the answer, then that Aura could pose another question.
- Feedback - Instead of just writing out feedback for 3d projects or handing back a graded rubric, teachers could record video feedback and use that as an Overlay for the student's work. Students could get their feedback by viewing the Aura attached to their projects. This Aura could be made private and shared only with that student.
- Building Human Bodies - Science teachers could create Overlays for skeletons that include muscle groups, nerves, organs, etc. Students could point their devices at the skeletons to what goes over the various parts.
- Textbook Videos - Teachers can make video of tutorials or helpful hints, and use them as Overlays for textbook or printed assignment Auras. When students are working at home, they can watch these videos in their textbooks when they need help.