Utilization of augmented reality in early childhood: A case study

The purpose of the research is to examine the use of the augmented reality technology in early childhood. The research was designed as a case study which is a qualitative research design. A sort of case study is the explanatory case study is conducted to give information about a situation. In the study, a holistic multiple design was used from the case study design. The research group was selected by appropriate sampling method and the criterion sampling method was used for the selection methods. The research group consisted of 18 children and 2 teachers, 9 of whom are boys and 9 are girls, attending the kindergarten of Afyon Kocatepe University in 2017-2018. Children are between 54-77 months. The implementation process lasted 5 weeks. The research data was collected with the semi-structured forms of study, observation, observation note, audio and video records. The data was analyzed with content analysis method. The results of the study show that the use of augmented reality technology in early childhood, attracts children's interest and attention, brings the feeling of reality to the children, embodies the content, supports the peer relations positively, provides the information colorful and visual at the same time and provides a fun environment to enable the children to participate in the activities and to focus on the activity. In addition to this, it is seen that augmented reality technology is sometimes a stimulating tool for children to participate in the activity, and sometimes it is a distraction tool that causes the activity to go out of its purpose. In addition, compared to some materials, augmented reality technology has been shown to prefer materials containing network technology in materials that are directly connected to real life, and which do not have a direct connection to real life. At the same time augmented reality technologies, it was concluded that the use in crowded classrooms in early childhood may cause problems in school and time management. At the end of the study, offered suggestions on the use of augmented reality technology in preschool period and future studies.