Exploiting the TARC framework: the relations between educators’ attitudes towards AR, innovativeness, digital skills, and AR skills in education

Augmented Reality (AR) can offer benefits to education however, its successful implementation heavily relies on teachers’ competencies personal characteristics, attitudes, and skills. The Teachers’ Augmented Reality Competences (TARC) framework defines the main AR capacity areas for educators to employ in their teaching practice: creating, using, and managing AR resources. The current study proposes and validates a model about the impact of teachers’ personal innovativeness, attitudes towards AR and digital skills on the TARC defined competence areas. Quantitative data was collected from 150 educators worldwide. Structured equation modeling was used for the analysis. The model explains and predicts approximately 73% of the capacity of teachers to use AR for teaching. The ability to create (design, develop and modify) and manage AR resources (search, evaluate, organize as well as address and resolve ethics and safety) directly impact teachers’ capacity to use AR for teaching. Teachers’ personal innovativeness, attitudes towards AR and digital skills also have found to have an impact. Study findings deemed important for educators considering their continuous professional development towards improving their digital and specifically Augmented Reality competences.