Incorporating a human parasite virtual reality experience into a tertiary microbiology teaching curriculum increases student engagement and learning outcomes

Microbiology, the study of microorganisms, is of critical importance to a variety of fields, including medicine, nursing, genetics, and immunology, as well as to students training to enter those fields. By definition, the objects of microbiology are too small to be seen with the naked eye, so its practitioners are well accustomed to using technology to make the invisible visible. From this perspective, virtual reality (VR) is a natural evolution from the microscope and the petri dish. We have conceptualized, designed, and tested a new virtual reality environment to teach undergraduate students how to diagnose a range of human parasitic diseases. Here we present our VR module as well as the qualitative and quantitative student feedback received from our second-year microbiology student cohort (<i>n</i> = 30). Furthermore, we discuss the challenges and opportunities associated with integrating VR into an internationally recognized university microbiology curriculum. This includes considerations at the curriculum design level, where we identify specific VR learning activities that could be added throughout the course, and at the application development level, where we present lessons learned from the development of a VR learning resource for parasitology education.