Before a single grade eight student in Ontario touches a lathe, they’re putting on a VR headset and learning a machine shop that isn’t real yet. Kris Abel walks through the first school in the country to try it, plus a zoo with no live animals and a soccer match played entirely by humanoid robots.

VR Before the Real Machines

Kris Abel explains how Fletcher Creek Senior Public School built a virtual machine shop so students learn safety habits, like putting on glasses before a machine starts, without any real risk. He also shares what growing up in his father’s machine shop taught him about spotting a dangerous workspace.

Robots That Actually Play the Game

From there, Kris Abel describes a traveling zoo made entirely of animatronic animals, funded by cookie sales instead of ticket prices, and a humanoid robot soccer match in South Korea that turned out far more entertaining than expected.

Topics: VR shop class, animatronic zoo, humanoid robot soccer, machine shop safety, tech news

GUEST: Kris Abel | krisabel.com | @realkrisabel

Originally aired on2026-07-14