School of Fun for Children in Fukushima

Please find a Japanese version of this report here.

We would like to take a look back at Academy Camp 2021 Summer VR Term 1 - "You Create Lunar Society!". The event was held over three days from July 22 to 24, 2021. 14 children from Fukushima and the rest of Japan joined this virtual camp from home.

In the morning of DAY 1, we went to "Academy Camp VR Moon" in the VR (virtual reality) space. That was where this adventure took place. Assuming the moon in the 2030's, there is the Apollo Project Memorial Park on the surface, and the vast space of the remains of lava flow behind the vertical hole discovered by Japan's KAGUYA spacecraft is there, where we would be building our lunar base. In the afternoon, we shared the "challenges of living in space and how to solve them" that we had heard from everyone when they applied for the camp, and discussed what kind of facilities would be necessary for the lunar society. Then we moved the stage to Minecraft and prototyped buildings for the lunar base.

In the morning of DAY 2, we tried out the lunar base prototype that was brought in to the virtual world from Minecraft. We figured out what does not look as expected, and continued prototyping. In the afternoon, using breakout rooms and virtual whiteboard, we had a world cafe-style discussion on the theme of what kind of society we want to create on the moon. First, we identified the issues that human beings are facing on Earth, and then we thought about whether these issues could be solved in the lunar society. In between, we went to our Moon in VR again to get a sense of what it would be like to live there. Thinking about creating a society from scratch, it seemed to us that the various issues we are currently facing on Earth would be easier to solve on the Moon. We would be happy if the experience of this camp could be a "takeaway" for us to bring that feeling back to our lives on Earth.

In the morning of DAY 3, we put the finishing touches on the creation of the lunar base buildings in Minecraft. In the afternoon, we exported our buildings from Minecraft and experienced in the form like a live game broadcast the usage of a set of open source software to integrate them into the virtual world. Then we all went to the VR moon and enjoyed the moon base that we created together while listening to each other's explanations.

Now, have we explored the moon enough? Alright, now on to Jupiter!
 

PLEASE HELP US LITTLE BY LITTLE

GlobalGiving holds the September 2021 Little by Little Campaign from September 13 to 17. All eligible donations up to $50 per unique donor per organization will be matched at 50% during the campaign, and funds will not run out! Please take this great opportunity to help further the children in Fukushima, those in the rest of Japan, and Academy Camp.

Links:

• Academy Camp Facebook Page in English