AR-VR Literacy

The Al Baydha Project, in rural, western Saudi Arabia, is a land restoration, poverty-alleviation, and heritage preservation program, based on principles of permacultural  and  hydrological  design.  Located roughly 50 kilometers (20 miles) south of Mecca, in Makkah Province, Al Baydha is an area characterized by the rocky, arid, foothills of the Hijaz Mountains. Bedouin tribes are the major residents of this region.

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As part of the poverty-alleviation goals of the project, and in partnership with Effat University (the first all female university in Saudi Arabia), I worked on a team at 5D Global Studio @ Wondros to create an AR/VR educational literacy tool.  Augmented Reality was used to identify physical flash cards, representing objects from the Bedouins' daily lives. Upon demonstrating competency in a specific literacy unit, the device is placed into a Samsung GearVR headset, where an interactive narrative involving the aforementioned literacy unit could be experienced in Virtual Reality.