Students use Z-Space to learn in virtual reality.
A new 3-D virtual reality device known as “Z-Space” is giving some Sioux City School District students a whole new experience in learning about the human body.
Anthony Gaul teaches an emergency medical responder class for the Career Academy, and says the virtual program lets them see a lot more.
“This is nothing that you can get out of a book. We talked a little about the heart in a prior class and today we were able bring the heart out. They can dissect pieces of the heart, take chambers apart, they can actually lean in with their virtual reality goggles on and they go inside the heart,” Gaul explains. “We just found a new feature of the program that we didn’t know about where we can take a video camera inside the heart as it is beating.”
East Sioux City senior Julietta Keuck says the program is very helpful. “I’m taking human anatomy and physiology, so it’s pretty helpful for that class too — especially since it goes farther in depth into all the systems and how they work, Keuck says.
Gaul is also the fire chief at Sergeant Bluff, and says they will use the program to train emergency responders and hospital personnel. “They’ve got a virtual EKG program that’s on here — and if there are certain heart problems — affecting maybe the lateral wall of the heart, it’ll show exactly where they will find that on the EKG,” according Gaul. He says Z-Space can be used in a lot of science classes and for other educational applications.
(By Woody Gottburg, KSCJ, Sioux City)