RESEARCH ARTICLE
Development of A Metaverse-Based Teaching Material on Rainforest Ecosystem for Nigerian High School Biology
Veronique Ojo Ogbanje1,2, Yong-Ju Kwon2*
1FCT Secondary Education Board, FCT-Abuja, Nigeria
2Korea National University of Education
Correspondence to kwonyj@knue.ac.kr
Brain, Digital, & Learning. Volume 13, Number 4, 353–366, December 2023. https://doi.org/10.31216/BDL.20230022
Received on December 5, 2023, Revised on December 20, 2023, Accepted on December 20, 2023, Published on December 31, 2023.
Copyright © 2023. Institute of Brain based Education, Korea National University of Education This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution Non-Commercial License (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/) which permits unrestricted non-commercial use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.
Abstract
This study focused on the development of a metaverse-based rainforest ecosystem for high school students and tested its effectiveness in terms of students’ academic achievement and learning satisfaction. In this study, the metaverse platform ZEP is used to simulate a rainforest ecosystem. ZEP jointly developed by Supercat and Naver Z was formally launched in Korea on March 16, 2022. ZEP is a platform where users can integrate through avatars and integrates the metaverse’s virtual space map, video conferences, materials, movies and presentations displayed in object form. Ease of access, cost-effectiveness, interactivity, and user-friendliness are some of the strengths of the ZEP metaverse platform. The ZEP metaverse materials for high school biology were developed to serve as a hybrid world between the real and the virtual world. Data collection for the metaverse group was carried out using the pretest-posttest method, comparing it with two control groups—one using textbooks and the other using videos. The results indicate that the experimental group with metaverse technology is effective in improving students’ learning achievement and satisfaction. Therefore, it is proposed that the metaverse in education is valuable for teachers and learners because it could lead to student engagement and motivation in the classroom.
Keywords
Metaverse, biology teaching material, ZEP, rainforest ecosystem, academic achievement, learning satisfaction.