TEACHERS were able to bring their lessons to life at Dorcan Academy last week by using a virtual reality app to take their pupils on a field trip like never before.

The Google Expeditions team visited the school as part of a nationwide program to give over 300 students the opportunity to experience the world through virtual reality headsets.

During the visit students were able to explore a wide range of places and environments, including the Great Barrier Reef, the Grand Canyon, the Borneo Rainforest, the battlefields of World War One and places of worship in Jerusalem.

In these different places, students were able to take a virtual tour to enhance their learning in history, geography and religious studies outside of the classroom.

Organised by head of global learning, Alan Brownlie, the visit happened after he stumbled across an advert on a teacher’s forum page on Facebook.

“The students really liked it because it was something they had never done before,” he said.

“We were able to use the app on every age group and applied the different expeditions to the topics each group were learning about at the moment.

“Some were able to see what the Great Barrier Reef looked like whereas Year 8 pupils were able to explore the Grand Canyon to help their project looking at different rocks.”

The newly-released app by Google allows a teacher acting as a ‘guide’ to lead classroom-sized groups of ‘explorers’ through collections of 360° and 3D images while pointing out interesting sights along the way.

It is hoped they will be able to use the technology in the future after the visit was deemed a resounding success.