Using Virtual Laboratories in

Teaching Natural Sciences:

An Example of Physics Courses
in University
YEVGENIYA DAINEKO,1 VIKTOR DMITRIYEV,2 MADINA IPALAKOVA1
1
Department of Computer Science and Software Engineering, International IT University, Almaty, Kazakhstan
2
Carl von Ossietzky University of Oldenburg, Oldenburg, Germany

Received 22 November 2015; accepted 9 October 2016

ABSTRACT: Thinking outside of the box is an important part of education. However, using innovative teaching
methods in education can be very challenging for educators. They are directly involved into a teaching process and
upcoming changes should be well planned and the impact of the introduced innovations/changes should be
estimated in advance. Innovations can be also challenging for a management part of a particular higher education
institution, whose major goal is to organize a smooth learning process. Current work presents software empowered
innovation in the domain of teaching physics at universities. Authors demonstrate how particular software artefacts
could be possible integrated into existing curriculum in order to help students at universities in mastering particular
natural science subject (e.g., “Physics-1,” “Physics-2”). Software is based on the ideas of virtual laboratories, whether
implementation is based on Microsoft. NET XNA Framework and 3D modeling. Paper shows that the introduction of
modern information and computer technologies along with the traditional forms of education are significantly
enhancing teaching experience and improving education quality. ß 2016 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Comput Appl Eng
Educ 25:39–47, 2017; View this article online at wileyonlinelibrary.com/journal/cae; DOI 10.1002/cae.21777

Keywords: physics virtual laboratory; higher education; teaching; 3D; 3D modeling physics

INTRODUCTION “physics” could be “a science about matter, its structure and

At the present time it is impossible to find a field of human activity,
where information technology is not employed or intensively
adopted. And education systems, for instance universities, are not
an exception. In this regard, new teaching techniques, which use
information technologies, and computer training systems, im-
plementing various teaching experiences are become highly
demanded by educators and managers [1]. Virtual laboratories,
independent from application domain, can be a successful
example of such computer training systems.
Physics is the natural science. It studies the simplest, and at the
same time, the most general properties of the material world that
surrounds humans in daily life. One of possible definition of
Correspondence to V. Dmitriyev (viktor.dmitriyev@uni-oldenburg.
de).
© 2016 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.
motion through space and time.” Consequently, physics creates a
foundation for other natural sciences. Thus, teaching physics cannot
be limited for students only to lectures full of theory. For instance,
activities when students can apply theoretical knowledge obtained
during lectures in practice are essential and could play a major
role in mastering fundamental laws. Usually, such activities are
implemented as laboratory works that enables students with
physical experiments realization. During such classes, students
acquire experimental skills, which include intellectual and practical
skills. Usually, classes with experiment are dedicated to improve
skills such as determining the goal of an experiment, making
various hypothesis, planning and executing an experiment,
calculating measurement/bias errors, analyzing results and prepar-
ing a report. And on later steps other type of skills such as working
with installation, observing, measuring and experimenting.
In some cases, scientific interpretation of a concept is only
possible if students acquaint themselves with the phenomena and
reconstruct the experiment during laboratory works. Also,
laboratory woks are very interesting for students, since at these

39
40 DAINEKO ET AL.
classes they learn the world around them based on their own
experience and feelings, but now occupied with theory combined
with experimental data obtain by themselves. In such a way,
during a laboratory work that consist out of a physical experiment
students enhance their knowledge in a particular section of physics
by acquiring new knowledge, getting familiar with experimental
equipment and evolving own logical and critical thinking
capabilities.
In order to perform particular physics experiments special
laboratories build. However, there may reasons why real
laboratories are unavailable to students (e.g., overloaded with
other experiments, budges shortage, time constantans, old/
outdated equipment, maintenance problems, etc.), virtual labora-
tories with 3D visualization of physics experiments could be a
good solution.
In general, a virtual laboratory is a combination of hardware
and software systems that allows to conduct physics related or
other domains (e.g., chemistry, etc.) experiments without direct
contact with an actual equipment. However, despite not providing
real equipment, experimental data generated by virtual laborato-
ries are empowered by mathematical models. Thus, by the end of a
particular experiment students are provided with plausible
experimental data for further processing and analysis. Moreover,
virtual laboratories within a teaching process can be especially
helpful, if the a real equipment is absent at all, which unfortunately
could be a case due to budged shortage or many other reasons [2].
In this work the Physics Virtual Laboratory (PVL) is
presented. PVL is a set of virtualized with help of software physics
experiment in various physics domains. It is developed by the
Department of Computer Engineering and Telecommunications at
the International IT University (IITU), Kazakhstan.
VIRTUAL LABORATORIES: ADVANTAGES
AND DISADVANTAGES
A typical virtual laboratory is a piece of software that allows to
simulate particular real laboratory experiment. Usage of virtual
laboratories instead or complimentary to real ones in teaching has
its own advantages and disadvantages:
(1) There is no need to purchase expensive equipment and
reagents. Due to lack of funding an installed old equipment
can distort the results of experiments and serve as a
potential source of danger. Carrying out virtual experi-
ments on a computer is significantly cheaper than
experiments on real equipment.
(2) Virtual laboratory allow to model objects, processes and
phenomena that cannot be realized within an educational
institution, or cannot be observed in reality at all. For
instance, because of the small size of an observed particles
or a process duration, lasting from fractions of seconds to
several years. For example, in the study of the
electromagnetic field theory one can show distribution
of lines of force and fields interaction clearly only with the
help of a virtual experiment, having good dynamic
graphics and sound.
(3) Virtual laboratory works are interactive. They are able to
respond to user actions in the in different ways. For
example, the weight of a selected object or its height of fall
can be changed only by pointing at it by a cursor.
(4) Virtual laboratories allow working with a wide range of
investigated elements and their parameters, and provide
a wide variety of operating modes of experimental
devices. In addition, within virtual laboratories it is
possible to create and realize a large number of options
for individual tasks in carrying out a laboratory as a
practical training for students. This, in its turn, increases
the efficiency of the individual approach to students,
enhances the effectiveness of learning, as well as
develops the spatial visualization ability.
(5) Virtual laboratories provide independence on a particular
laboratory, that is, virtual laboratory activities are possible
to carry out in places equipped only with computers. Such
approach allows to perform laboratory works on an
unlimited number of work places without additional costs
to establish laboratory facilities.
(6) Virtual laboratories can be used as demonstrations during
lectures, without large facilities and material costs. They
can be performed by students under the guidance of a
teacher, as well as through the self-study. For example, a
virtual laboratory allows a student, who has missed some
of the topics, to fill the gaps independently from the
teacher’s presence in the workplace and to perform the
tasks during convenient for him/her times. Moreover, such
laboratories can be conducted remotely.
(7) Virtual laboratories provide increased safety. On can be
involved easily and safely in the virtual experiment, it can
be checked and cancelled at any time without loss of data.
The disadvantages of the use of virtual works can be
attributed as follows: the impossibility of real research, which does
not allow students to fully develop practical skills, such as the use
of measuring instruments, how they are connected, the measure-
ment of physical quantities, and the mastery of the method of
experiments.
Thus, the efficiency of the use of virtual laboratories in
teaching depends on how methodically competently and ped-
agogically justified their inclusion in the structure of the learning
process and well established curricula.
VIRTUAL LABORATORIES: USAGE OF LABORATORIES
WHILE TEACHING PHYSICS
The Features of the PVL
It is known, that physics studies the processes, which occur in the
material world around us, and the laws that characterize these
processes from physical point of view. Therefore, in order to make
students understand this course in particular and physical laws in
general better, it is highly important to employ simulations and
modeling of the real world processes, as well as demonstrations of
how different instruments and devices work within the physical
experiments [3,4]. At the same time, it is not enough just to show
students the functionalities and features of a particular physical
equipment, device or material. Such type of tasks can be easily
accomplished by using a pre-recorded experiment or “non-
interactive” experiment simulation (e.g., video). It is quite
important to demonstrate the principles of the physics laws of
the real world. The fundamental difference of the proposed
approach is that students are offered an opportunity to influence
the flow of an experiment on their own. Using suggested teaching
 USING VIRTUAL LABORATORIES IN TEACHING NATURAL SCIENCES
tool a particular student directly participates in experiment and
able to control physics process/law he or she studies. This feature
is an undeniable advantage of this approach and one of the
fundamental factors of the efficient learning.
However, besides virtual laboratories have a lot of
advantages there are a number of challenges they provide to
adaptors. And one of such challenge, which can be even a
blocker issue, is a standardization and justification with
established and adapter teaching plans and curricula at various
universities. The PVL contains the 3D virtual experiments,
which are included to the basic physics curriculum, provided as
a core standard for the technical majors. In other words, the
authors ensure that the content of all of laboratory works within
the PVL corresponds to the educational standard of the Republic
of Kazakhstan. And as long as the universities supposed to
follow the state educational standard, which specifies the
content of the mandatory courses including physics, PVL can be
seamlessly integrated into curricula of Kazakhstan universities.
In this regard, the virtual laboratory can be applied while
teaching physics courses to students of almost any technical
major. Another difference between the PVL and its analogues is
that the PVL provides the three versions for each of the
laboratory works: in Kazakh, Russian and English languages,
since students in Kazakhstan can study in any of these
languages. The PVL (Fig. 1) is used in teaching “Physics-1”
and “Physics-2” courses to the students of the “Computer
Science and Software Engineering,” “Information Systems,”
“Mathematical and Computer Modeling,” and “Radio electron-
ics and Telecommunications” majors in the university. Despite
authors experience is heavily one country oriented they believe
that their experience can be adopted in other universities of other
countries as well.
Figure 1 Entry point—view on the “main launcher” component.
41
The Content and the Structure of the PVL
It is widely accepted fact that information communication
technologies evolve very fast. The existing solutions become out-
of-date quickly and lose their relevance. There are new problems
whose solution requires the development of new methods, software
tools and technologies. Students should internalize and convert the
huge and growing amount of information, quickly learn new
products and apply knowledge in practice.
To ensure high-quality and mobility of education at the
university an innovative project for teaching students—a virtual
laboratory for “Physics-1” and “Physics-2” courses (Fig. 1) was
developed and implemented. One of the advantages of such
computer training system as a virtual laboratory is that it’s content
is not more static, also including theoretical part. The new
components can be included and, consequently, the functionality
of the laboratory widens. Thus, within PVL project new virtual
laboratory works are developed and added periodically. At the
moment the PVL contains nine physical laboratory works realized
in the form of virtual experiments. The topics of the laboratory
works are taken from such physics sections as “Mechanics,”
“Atomic and Quantum Physics,” “Electricity and Magnetism,”
and “Molecular Physics”.
The structure of each laboratory work follows the general
template in order to simplify interaction experience of student.
According to it, each laboratory work includes following parts:
(1) Theoretical material, which provides the goal of an
experiment, the useful information from the corresponding
physics chapter with the formulas for the calculation of the
required quantities, the description of the equipment used
for the experiment with illustrations and photographs, the
42 DAINEKO ET AL.
step-by-step procedure of the experiment and the require-
ments for the lab report with the specification of the required
tables, graphs and conclusions. The theoretical material of
all the laboratory works is gathered into an electronic
textbook. Hypertext, links, animation and dynamic objects
improve students’ perception of the material and help them
to master it.
(2) A test that contains set of questions. Every time it is
possible to check the performance and, therefore, to
determine, if a student is ready to perform an experiment
or he/she needs an additional theoretical preparation. A
test can be taken before and after the implementation of the
experiment (Fig. 2).
(3) An experiment realization module with 3D visualization of
the studied physics phenomena. In each laboratory work it is
possible to change the initial parameters of the experiment
and perform it several times with minimum efforts.
(4) A user’s guide with information about how to use the
application and its hot keys.
The interfaces of the experiments realization modules are
designed according to the same pattern as well. The example is
shown in the Figure 3. The window of the application is divided
into four parts:
(1) The main frame on the left shows an installation of an
experiment. Here the visualization of the physical process
takes place.
(2) The Settings frame, where a user can change the initial
parameters of the laboratory work and, in such a way,
control the flow of the experiment.
(3) The Data frame displays the tables with the results of the
laboratory work (output physical quantities).
Figure 2 View of the 3D scene of the photo-conductivity related virtual experiment.
(4) The Controls frame with the “Start Experiment” button for
the experiment execution and the “Information“ button for
the user’s guide activation.
The results of measurements need to be presented as a final
report. Its example is given in each laboratory work. The types of
tables, charts and output physical quantities are specified.
Conclusions drawn from the results are a mandatory for the
report in order to make it full and representative. An important part
of the conclusion is a critical analysis of the results and the
evaluation of the measurement errors. In order to improve the
clarity of the experiment results presentation students may change
the format of the report.
The PVL Implementation
The virtual laboratory is realized with use of 3D scenes, which
visualize experiments and allow observing studied processes in
space. The software products Blender and Maya 3D were employed
to design realistic 3D models for each laboratory work. The
functionality of the laboratory with the physics engine that
implements the interaction between objects of the model is written
in C# (.NET) based on the XNA 4.0 framework. The software is easy
to master and to use. And this is one of the reasons of choosing these
products. On the other hand, the framework provides convenient
environment for efficient code revision and editing. The software
modules are mutually independent, and this guarantees the
qualitative performance. Moreover, the framework supports a
plenty of image types and graphic models; contains a number of low
level libraries for the work with content and equipment; and
provides reasonable use of memory for games based on images.
The component diagram of the presented software package is
shown on the Figure 4. The diagram is adopted with the significant
 USING VIRTUAL LABORATORIES IN TEACHING NATURAL SCIENCES 43

Figure 3 Instructions for a laboratory work together with MCQ tester example.

improvements from the previous work of the authors [5,6]. First, While performing any experiments in real life there is always
three new laboratory works have been included into the laboratory, a place for errors, which boils down to the rule of the thumb “There
namely “Study of the Direct Current Laws” (DIRECT CUR- are no measurements without error.” A very basic model is the
RENT), “Investigation of the Ohm’s Law for the Alternating Gauss model of errors, which breaks down the error into two
Current” (ALTERNATING CURRENT), and “Franck-Hertz pieces, the chance error, which is a random quantity with
Experiment” (FRANCK-HERTZ). And they follow the same expectation 0:
format accepted for the laboratory works in the PVL with the
Measurement ¼ True value þ Change error þ Bias ½8
theoretical material, 3D simulation of the experiments and tests for
students’ self-control. Second, all of the laboratory works are
Due to the virtual nature of the discussed experiments, it
implemented in three languages. Initially, the theoretical material,
makes no sense to introduce bias related part of the error. But from
the tests and the user interface were realized only in English, since time to time “bias” in virtual laboratories introduced by software
in our university students study in English language. But in the
related errors and bugs, which is totally another discussion.
most of the universities of Kazakhstan the main languages are
A method of errors estimation and calculation in the virtual
Kazakh and Russian. Therefore, we implemented all of the
laboratory, plotting of the dependences of physical quantities with
laboratory works in these languages as well, in order to introduce
these errors is as follows. After the value is determined by a random
the PVL in other higher educational institutions of the country.
number generator that produces an output result in this range, thus
And finally, in the new version of the PVL several implementation
simulating the value obtained using the error on the experimental
errors were fixed.
setup. The further analysis is conducted using all the common rules:
In general, the components on the diagram on the Figure 4
calculate the relative error (if the measurement is indirect), then the
can be combined into three groups: (1) launcher, (2) laborato-
absolute error. The result is presented in the form of an interval:
ries, and (3) additional. The Main Launcher component should
be seen as an entry point to other components, whereas the d ¼ d  SE;
“additional” components are represented by the testing engine
where d is an average of the investigating value and SE a “standard
and the content template. A core part of the PVL software
error,” which is based on standard deviation of the mean and total
package is the collection of six laboratories. Each laboratory
number of measurements (SE ¼ psffiffin). Of course introduced
uses the “Content Template” component as unified source of the
standard error of measurement doesn’t reflect real measurement
3D objects shared among all the virtual experiments. And
error that could be faced during laboratory experiments. But it
besides sharing common 3D objects, each implemented virtual
provides an understanding to students that reality may be much
laboratory follows the particular structure of a class organiza-
complex, that ideal mathematical model dedicated to reflect
tion. For example, the class organization of the Atwood’s
particular physical phenomena.
machine experiment is shown on the Figure 5. More detailed
description how Atwood machine experiment was implemented
User Acceptance of PVL
as virtual laboratory within PVL can be found in work
“Implementing physics virtual laboratory in 3D: An example Physical experiments are essential in teaching physics. They allow
of Atwood machine” [7]. lecturers to explain a physical processes and laws visually and in
44 DAINEKO ET AL.
Figure 4 Physics virtual laboratory component diagram.
more details. Students get better understanding of theoretical
material observing the studied process in reality.
Usually, physics educational experiments are conducted in
laboratories. But, not all universities are able to equip real labs due
to some reasons like high cost of the laboratory equipment, lack of
enough space due to large size of devices and others. In this situation
students study only theoretical material and cannot examine the
physical laws and processes experimentally at all. That is why the
authors of the work had laid the foundation of the PVL project.
In the 2015/2016 academic year’s spring term the PVL was
introduced into the educational process of the university as part of
the “Physics-1” course. Students were able to observe and verify
the laws of physics, master the skills of experimental research,
understand functionality of the equipment and devices involved,
and process data obtained as a results of measurements.
At the end of the course, the teachers conducted a survey
among 40 students. The goal was to understand, weather the PVL in
particular, and such type of computer training systems in general, is
an effective learning supplementary tool for students. They were
asked to fill survey that contained five questions and each question
had five answers. Students could choose one of the following
answer: (1) no, (2) rather no, (3) do not know, (4) rather yes, (5) yes
for the questions number 3–5, weather first two questions had a bit
different meaning of the scale (see questions in Table 1). The results
of the survey are shown in the Table 1. A number in a cell shows
how many students (in per cents) have chosen the answer presented
in the corresponding column for the question in the row.
According to the results of the survey, students confirmed
effectiveness of the adopted approach. In cases, when a real laboratory
is unavailable, a virtual one can be employed as an effective learning
tool, which supplements real equipment, solids theoretical knowledge
and increases the interest in the physics domain.
RELATED WORKS
According to the work mentioned in Ref. [9] it is important for
scholars to document the process of the literature search from the
 USING VIRTUAL LABORATORIES IN TEACHING NATURAL SCIENCES
Figure 5 Physics virtual laboratory’s “Atwood machine” experiment in form of class diagram.
methodological point of view. Providing descriptions of the
literature search process gives understanding to readers and
answers questions like “Why a particular decision about a
particular work to be included into the review was made?” First of
all, the search process for the relevant literature was done in the
digital library of Web Of Science1. The key words used in
the search were “3D Virtual Laboratory,” which provided 205
responses in total. In parallel with the key words, the following
configurations were applied: (1) the period for searching was set to
5 years (between 2010 and 2015); (2) the research domain was
fixed to “science technology”; (3) the research areas were fixed to
“Computer Science” and “Education Educational Research”; (4)
the language was restricted to English. A very careful work with
the search results is required because of the broadness of the
selected keywords. For instance, the library search engine often
responses with the publications related only to the image
processing in case of “3D” keyword usage, whereas on the key
word “laboratory” there are a lot of results on “safety” and other
related to the “pure laboratory” topics, which roughly have
correlations with the current work. The search in the digital library
DBLP2 for the key words “3D Virtual Laboratory,” “3D
Laboratory,” “Physics Laboratory” gave in total 47 responses
(with intersections between various keywords compilation). No
other restrictions such as time period, particular words exclusions,
etc. were applied. In addition to above mentioned digital libraries,
searching was done in World Scientific and Engineering Academy
and Society3 digital library using above mentioned key words and
their combinations.
As it was mentioned earlier, virtual laboratories have a
number of advantages. That is why they are widely used for the
educational purposes. Almost in any field of knowledge real
experiments and practical tasks can be replaced by their virtual
1
http://apps.webofknowledge.com/
2
http://dblp.uni-trier.de/db/
3
http://www.wseas.org/
45
analogues, which are safer and cheaper, but at the same time
efficient and informative as real ones.
Thus, in Ref. [10] the authors discuss the development of the
virtual laboratory for teaching Python programming language.
The laboratory is implemented using the GraphTerm server and
includes such experimental components as a virtual dashboard and
progressively fillable notebooks, which ensure the step-by-step
completion of a sequence of tasks.
The on-line laboratory [11], based on the web technology, is
supposed to be used for the applied research within the Process
Control Engineering subject. The laboratory includes the on-line
and off-line modules with high level of interactivity and
scalability. Using the on-line synchronous module the control
devices in the Process Control Engineering laboratory (the
Petroleum-Gas University of Ploiesti, Romania) can be operated
remotely. The off-line asynchronous module represents the virtual
part and allows studying the simulated control loops and
components. Both types of applications have the friendly user
interfaces and give students a chance to practice before carrying
out the real experiments.
In Ref. [12] the authors suggest a method to set up a virtual
physics laboratory in the Internet applying the virtual reality
technology. This solution protects students from possible dangers,
which might occur in the real lab. The system reduced the learning
time and improved the performance on the course.
In Ref. [13] the web-based 3D virtual control laboratory is
presented. The system is implemented using the NCSLab
framework with a six-tier distributed structure. The 3D models
of the devices are reconstructed in the users’ browsers in order to
maximize the sense of presence in the real lab. Users are able to
observe the flow of the experiment, since the 3D images are
synchronized with the remote simulation. Besides, they can
operate the virtual devices using mice and keyboards.
The combination of audio, video and animation is suggested
in the on-line application of the Virtual Laboratory for Digital
Logic [14]. This Lab is designed for the students of Information
Technology department to help them to understand the logic
46 DAINEKO ET AL.
Table 1 The Results of the Survey
Questions
Q1: Please, rate how realistic are experiments of PVL
(from 1 to 5, where 1 is not realistic, 5 is very realistic).
Q2: Please, rate the easiness of working with the virtual laboratory
(from 1 to 5, where 1 is not easy, 5 is very easy).
Q3: Are the developed Physics Virtual Laboratory useful as
an additional and convenient source of information and
knowledge in the corresponding field?
Q4: Do the developed Physics Virtual Laboratory help to
obtain a better idea of the material, than after reading a book?
Q5: Do the developed virtual laboratory works help to raise
the interest to study physics?
circuits. The system allows practicing in designing the circuit
board applying the different instruments and methods. The similar
virtual laboratory in Ref. [15] is based on Easy Java Simulations
and developed of the learning of the electrical machines in marine
engineering.
One of the “new” means in education is teaching environ-
ments, which use 3D graphics [16]. Such applications provide
easy and flexible interaction, which is important to attract students
and increase their motivation. In Ref. [16] the view on the
interactive 3D virtual worlds, which are used while teaching
through the Internet, is presented. The authors propose a system
based on the interactive 3D virtual learning environment for the
Computer Graphics course. Students are able to take part virtually
in the simulated lab experiments.
Another example is the development of 3D Virtual Radio-
pharmacy Laboratory [17], where students are represented by their
3D avatars. Within the laboratory they can conduct the experi-
ments using the equipment of the radio-pharmacy and carrying out
the specific learning scenarios. Moreover, the system provides the
ways of communication between students and mentors.
The web environment iVirtualWorld [18] is a virtual
chemistry laboratory, which provides the high level of interactiv-
ity. The 3D objects, which are needed for the experiment, can be
selected from the 2D menu. Besides, using the graphical user
interface, it is possible to give them initial properties.
It is also worth mentioning the MMVL—Multimodal Virtual
Laboratory for the conducting of chemistry experiments [19]. It is
a 3D virtual environment, where students can carry out the
chemical experiments like in a real lab. It is possible to choose the
chemicals and glassware. Each part of the experiment is
accompanied by audio and textual information. In addition, the
equation of the chemical reaction is shown on the virtual board.
There are also works on the intersection of virtual and real
worlds, which are mainly driven by virtual reality ideas. For
instance, the work [20] mainly focuses on human-computer
interaction (HCI) interfaces dedicated to the virtual reality in 3D
worlds. It argues for usage of 3D virtual laboratories by improving
aspects such as empowerment, learning by doing, sustaining
interest, teaching performance, real-time feedback, ICT usage, etc.
The work describes in details how to establish hardware
components (in particular case cameras) and what exact
algorithms and approaches were used for extracting feature sets
from obtained images (hand position detection). It shows why
particular machine learning (as well as computer vision) methods
were selected in comparison with others. For demonstration
Answers
1 (no) 2 (rather no) 3 (do not know) 5 (rather yes) 5 (yes)
5% 15% 78% 2%
8% 80% 12%
15% 85%
10% 90%
14% 86%
purpose two sample experiments (physics and chemistry) were
implemented in form of virtual laboratories.
In order to summarize related works it worth to mention that
virtual laboratories listed above have their own advantages and
disadvantages. There are virtual laboratories that are domain
specifics (e.g., MMVL for chemistry experiments), another
laboratories are evolving in direction of virtual reality and
creation of “avatars,” another laboratories are providing on-line
and remote access to real equipment, and some laboratories are
limited to 2D representation of 3D objects. The main different
PVL is that it was designed based on own generic and extendable
platform (including 3D models), which allows to add more and
more experiments with time [6]. PVL also tries to reflect real 3D
object in virtual world close to reality as much as possible. It also
provides a unified user experience for users, thus they do not need
to spend much time learning “mechanical” part of virtual
laboratories and focus more on content part.
CONCLUSION
As related work section suggest, a popularity of virtual
laboratories within a teaching process grows and gains more
attention around the globe, especially for the university level
degrees (e.g., bachelor and master). An efficiency of an
education system, which uses virtual laboratories to facilitate
better understanding of a subject, is increased through higher
convenience and acceptance from students in learning the
theoretical and practical aspects of the studied subject (mainly in
STEM related majors). The current work demonstrates the
implemented software package, which contains nine physical
experiments from various domains of physics integrated into a
single curricula. The work advocates usage of physics virtual
laboratories in universities and demonstrates that implemented
software (PVL) is actively used in teaching process at the
university. PVL software packages evolves, new experiments
are added to the existing ones and besides experiments already
integrated into PVL there are some experiments, which are
offered to the students via web browsers.
ACKNOWLEDGMENT
The project was accomplished with the financial support of the
Science Committee of the Ministry of Education and Science of
 USING VIRTUAL LABORATORIES IN TEACHING NATURAL SCIENCES
the Republic of Kazakhstan according to the Program of grant
funding of scientific research in 2015–2017, 2622/ГФ4, reg. no
20150115PK01145.
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BIOGRAPHIES
Yevgeniya Daineko received her PhD degree
from Al-Farabi Kazakh National University
(Kazakhstan). Currently Evgeniya is an assistant
professor and senior researcher at International
Information Technology University (Kazakhstan).
Her academic interests mainly include Design,
Development and Further Integrations of E-
Learning Curricula in Physic Disciplines, as well
as research in Nanocrystalline Semiconductors.
Viktor Dmitriyev received his Master degree
from Kazakh-British Technical University. He
worked as a lecturer in the International Informa-
tion Technology University (Kazakhstan), where
he also was an ACM ICPC team coach and
authored couple of courses (e.g.“Fundamentals of
Programming and Algorithms”). Currently he is a
PhD student at the University of Oldenburg
(Germany) and his primary research interests
are Big Data Analysis, In-Memory Computing,
Business Intelligence and Education.
47
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2206–2217.
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International Conference on Educational Technologies (EDUTE’08),
Corfu, Greece, 2008, pp 46–51.
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physics laboratory, ICALT, IEEE (2003), p 455.
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for digital logic. In: Proceedings of the 7th WSEAS International
Conference on E-ACTIVITIES (E-ACTIVITIES ’08), Cairo, Egypt,
2008, pp 139–142.
[15] P. Casals-Torrens and R. Bosch-Tous, Virtual labs for learning
electrical machines in marine engineering. In: Proceedings of the
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Engineering (MN’10), Constantza, Romania, 2010, pp 108–112.
[16] K. Barbatsis, P. Fotaris, T. Mastoras, and A. Manitsaris, A web-based
learning environment exploiting 3D Virtual Worlds. In: 1st WSEAS/
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[17] A. Alexiou, C. Bouras, E. Giannaka, V. Kapoulas, M. Nani, and T.
Tsiatsos, Using VR technology to support e-learning: the 3D virtual
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[18] Y. Zhong and C. Liu, A domain-oriented end-user design
environment for generating interactive 3D virtual chemistry experi-
ments, Multimedia Tools Appl 72 (2014), 2895–2924.
[19] N. Ali, S. Ullah, I. Rabbi, and A. Alam, The effect of multimodal
virtual chemistry laboratory on students’ learning improvement.
Augmented and Virtual Reality, Springer, 2014, pp 65–76.
[20] T. Ma, X. Xiao, W. Wee, C. Y. Han, and X. Zhou, A 3D virtual
learning system for STEM education. Virtual, Augmented and Mixed
Reality. Applications of Virtual and Augmented Reality, Springer,
2014, pp 63–72.
Madina Ipalakova received her degree Cand. of
Tech. Sci. degree from East Kazakhstan State
Technical University named after D. Serikbayev
(Kazakhstan) and her Master degree from Man-
chester University. Currently Madina is an assistant
professor and researcher at International Informa-
tion Technology University (Kazakhstan). Her
research interests include Design, Development
and Further Integrations of E-Learning Curricula in
Related to Computer Science Disciplines.