INCREASING USE OF EXISTING TRAINING DEVICES THROUGH AUGMENTED REALITY. AN EXPERIENCE IN TWO COURSES

Many courses could benefit from lab practical training. However, implementing this training for a high number of enrolled students requires a large enough number of devices and lecturer hours. In this paper, two experiences, corresponding to two master courses, providing additional information through students’ mobile devices (phones or tablets) are presented. In a course of Hydropower Engineering, seeing the operation of real turbines has an obvious educational value. Although there are two hydro turbines in the Hydraulic Lab of the Department, its use is limited by lecturer availability. In order to increase their educational use, several optical labels that link to appropriate web pages were attached to these devices. Following some of these links, videos showing real operation of these turbines are gotten. In addition, other links provide some basic information about these devices characteristics. Therefore, students could see simultaneously the real devices and, through their mobile devices, additional information about these hydro turbines. In a Railway Engineering course, knowing the characteristics and evolution of rolling and fixed stock is very important. In several public zones of the Escuela de Ingenieros de Caminos, Canales y Puertos (Civil Engineering School) of the Universidad Politécnica de Madrid, there are several scale models of ancient rolling stock and of fixed stock. In this case, optical labels have been attached to these models that link to web pages describing their main characteristics. A link to an email address for sending comments is also provided. All the material developed, videos, images, documents, is also directly available in a web site.