It is essential for undergraduates as preservice primary schoolteachers to be well-prepared for facing the socio-scientific issues on foot health and self-care practices arising commonly in the local schools and ageing communities in South Taiwan. Purpose: In order to explore to what extent and how learning with integration of new technologies could affect preservice schoolteachers’ understanding of science popularization regarding plantar medical science, this study focused on: 1) What was the impact of learning with augmented reality (AR) and artificial intelligence (AI) applications on the preservice schoolteachers’ understanding of plantar medical science; 2) How did learning with AR and AI applications facilitate the preservice schoolteachers’ knowledge transparency of science popularization concerning plantar medical science. Methods: This study leveraged the hands-on learning approach with AR and AI applications to promote the underlying future schoolteachers’ competencies in science popularization concerning plantar medical science. The participants were forty-four undergraduates with neither technological nor medical science learning background attending a teacher education course at university in South Taiwan. The participants were required to employ AR and AI techniques to co-design learning materials with a particular learning focus on plantar medical science and self-care education for schoolchildren. Questionnaires and interviews served as the main approaches for data collection. Results: Findings showed that as technological novices and non-medical science students, most preservice schoolteachers experienced frustration when absorbing and practicing new skills for developing digital learning content. Yet, it was anticipated that the participants were ultimately satisfied with the substantial progress in designing with AR and AI, and that the learning approach promoted their real-world knowledge of science popularization. Conclusions: The results revealed that hands-on learning with new technologies not simply offered preservice schoolteachers a feasible entry point to develop conceptual understanding of medical science, but promoted their abilities to design digital game-based learning materials centring on plantar pressures and healthcare. This was expected to further provide the local schoolchildren with more interactive and interesting learning content for promoting science popularization.