The current pedagogical debate highlights the urgent need to transcend traditional school models by fostering flexible, personalized, and interconnected learning environments. This paper investigates the potential of the inclusive virtual museum as a generative space that supports embodied and participatory learning, grounded in the flipped inclusion model. Within this dynamic educational ecosystem, students, teachers, and digital-cultural resources interact collaboratively, fostering the co-construction of knowledge. By integrating immersive technologies such as augmented, virtual, and extended reality (AR/VR/XR), and employing multisensory storytelling, virtual museums engage both cognitive and bodily dimensions of learning, promoting synesthetic, affective, and meaningful experiences.

This exploratory study examines inclusive educational practices in both formal and informal contexts, with a particular focus on the "ScanItaly" virtual museum model. A mixed-methods design will be used to evaluate the impact of immersive technologies on students’ performance, perception of experience, and sense of inclusion. Data collection includes qualitative observation grids, semi-structured interviews with teachers and learners, and narrative outputs produced by students during XR-enhanced workshops. The study employs convenience sampling and will be conducted throughout the school year in a series of participatory lab-based activities.

Our research aims to stimulate critical reflection on how inclusive virtual museums can be leveraged not only to innovate educational experiences but also to promote ethical and socially responsible learning environments. These environments aim to develop prosocial values and support systemic ecological well-being by enhancing each learner’s potential in relation to others. Particular attention is paid to digital corporeality and sensory engagement as key factors in enhancing motivation, accessibility, and knowledge retention.

The core research question is: Can virtual museums promote accessibility and inclusion and foster meaningful, hands-on learning?
Findings suggest that inclusive virtual museums represent a promising frontier for education beyond traditional classrooms. When grounded in inclusive pedagogical frameworks, these environments empower students to become active agents of learning through immersive, interactive, and embodied experiences. This approach supports well-being, equity, and the acquisition of 21st-century skills, particularly in non-formal and lifelong learning settings. Educational institutions and cultural actors are encouraged to invest in such models to co-design learning environments where corporeality, affect, and technology converge meaningfully and inclusively.

Keywords: Virtual museum, inclusion, extended reality.