Mobile Learning in Schools

Key Issues, Opportunities and Ideas for Practice

Jocelyn Wishart

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2017
• eBook ISBN: 9781134997664
• Topic: Education
• Subtopic: Education General

Mobile Learning in Schools explores the potential for using mobile devices in diverse school and college settings around the globe. It evaluates the exciting opportunities mobile initiatives bring and shares experience of where things can go wrong, in order to ensure that those embarking on new projects are fully informed.

Drawing on a wide range of international perspectives, it unpicks knotty sociocultural issues, including lack of sustainability, behavioural and ethical concerns, and explores successful student learning. Key issues considered include:

• mobile learning in primary schools
• teaching and learning with mobile devices in secondary schools
• opportunities inside and outside school
• pedagogical principles and sustainability
• mobile learning for initial teacher training and CPD
• ethical considerations
• behaviour matters – disruption, plagiarism, cheating, cyberbullying
• assessing mobile learning.

With annotated further reading and questions to trigger reflection and further discussion amongst readers, this thought-provoking text provides a detailed survey of this often controversial topic. It is essential reading for all those engaged in understanding the potential for using mobile devices to support students' learning.

1
Introduction to this book

So, what actually is happening in respect of the use of mobile devices in schools today? Well, practice varies widely and is not really consistent even within school federations or districts, let alone countries. In 2015, two researchers, Clarke and Svanaes, working on behalf of an education research charity, pointed out that several countries have recently introduced large-scale mobile technology deployment schemes. These included Malaysia, India, Lebanon, Finland, the Netherlands, France, Northern Ireland, Scotland, Jamaica and Columbia. However, managing such large-scale deployment is not without its challenges and, in other countries including South Africa, Turkey, Thailand and the USA, such schemes have been delayed or even abandoned. Reasons for this include an inappropriate technical infrastructure, a lack of appropriate educational content, concerns for student wellbeing and cost. In these latter cases though, it appears that research was not used effectively to establish the parameters for successful adoption of technology in schools (Clarke and Svanaes, 2015). Hopefully this book will go some way to address that concern.

Currently, the mobile technology in schools spectrum includes: teachers using mobile phone video for professional development; schools that have been issued with a bookable class set of tablet computers such as iPads; teachers in schools where mobile phones are banned quietly suggesting students use their mobile phones to capture or support learning opportunities; students whose parents are required to supply them with tablet devices; and schools where students bring their mobile phones openly to class. It is recognised that teaching through mobile learning opportunities brings many challenges; indeed, Chapters 7 and 8 in this book discuss in detail both behavioural and ethical questions arising over the use of mobile devices in schools. Many schools and colleges, counties and states, even some countries, have banned mobile phones in their entirety. For some parents who consider such devices at best a distraction this is absolutely the right thing to do, yet for others, it is a waste of a valuable tool. Others focus on the fact that they can be used by parents or carers or even the school leadership to transmit essential information in an emergency. But what do the students themselves think?

In the USA, Thomas and Muñoz (2016) surveyed 628 high school students in a large urban school district to determine their perceptions of mobile phone use in the classroom. Their findings indicated that the majority of students (90.7%) were using a variety of mobile phone features for school-related work. This included everyday use of the calculator, accessing the internet, the calendar and the clock or timer. Also popular were educational apps, playing music and texting with email and watching video but were reported by fewer students. Student support for educational uses of their phones, however, was not universal. Only 73.8% of the students supported integrating mobile phones into classroom instruction, while 70.6% believed that mobile phones supported learning. It was clear that, while recognising their usefulness as educational tools, the students too had serious concerns about the disruptions caused by using mobile phones in the classroom and the potential for their inappropriate use. The same conflict reappears in schools across the globe. In a large-scale study of over 1,000 school students from South Africa, Porter et al. (2016) reported nearly three-quarters of them as saying that they have experienced some personal positive impact of mobile phone use towards doing well at school. However, only a slightly smaller proportion (70%) reported associated classroom disruption by their own or by another student’s phone. In another recent but smaller survey, this time from Austria, Grimus and Ebner (2016) report students aged from 11 to 14 as recognising potential mobile phone-based learning opportunities such as internet search, use as a calculator, educational apps and tools, dictionaries and translators. Yet, by and large, the students did not associate use of their mobile phones with learning, with the majority reporting concerns over distraction and cheating. Though, that said, the boys also tended to report less handwriting and fewer books to carry as benefits. The situation is mirrored in Slovenia where, despite the fact that most of the students own a smartphone (and still more of them own a tablet), education that incorporates mobile learning is only spreading slowly (Ferko and Korenˇová, 2015). Grimus and Ebner (2016) go on to note though that this is short-sighted; in Austria compulsory education ends at 15 and, if students haven’t learned to use their phones productively by then, they are liable to miss out on lifelong learning opportunities. They conclude that students’ perceptions of using mobile phone tools for formal and informal learning, as a part of their personal learning environment, needs to be part of education today. Indeed, UNESCO policy guidelines (West and Vosloo, 2013) suggest mobile technology is a powerful but often overlooked tool. It can support education in ways that were not possible before its arrival.

However, there are few studies that show measurable learning gains that can be confidently attributed to the use of mobile devices in schools and at least one, based on data from schools in four English cities, that found quite the opposite. When schools had a mobile phone ban in place there were associated small but statistically significant improvements in students’ national test scores with the lowest-achieving students gaining twice as much as average students (Beland and Murphy, 2015). But then again, Cristol and Gimbert’s (2013) evaluation study of 330 students from a Midwest US school district, though smaller, found statistically significantly higher recorded scores in state achievement assessments of students in the classes that utilised mobile learning devices on a regular basis. These included in reading and maths at 8th Grade and in social studies and science at 10th Grade. With these conflicting findings it appears that we need to look more closely at the different school policies and the actual types of uses being made of the devices. Interestingly, handheld tablet computers with much the same capabilities as smartphones usually gain a different reception. Haßler et al.’s (2016) critical review of research into the use of tablets by primary and secondary school children found the majority of studies described positive learning outcomes. Teachers in these studies appreciated in particular their ease of use, customisation and portability, alongside the integration of multiple features within a single touchscreen device.

In addition though, to these contradictory findings over attitudes to, practices with and opinions about the use of mobile devices in schools there has been long debate within the academic community as to what exactly mobile learning is and how to define it. I will detail this debate and its history in the next chapter; however, for the purposes of this book I am using the helpfully concise definition of mobile learning developed by Helen Crompton, an ex-school teacher now lecturing at a university in Virginia, USA, in which mobile learning is

learning across multiple contexts, through social and content interactions, using personal electronic devices

(Crompton, 2013, p.4)

These contexts can be real or virtual, thus mobile learning can be classroom based with, for example, the use of educational apps on iPads or outside class, capitalising on opportunities to capture and analyse data during field trips and museum or gallery visits. Chapter 2 also includes an introduction to the wide range of functions and tools on mobile devices that can and have been used to support learning, presenting the most characteristic opportunities in and challenges to their use. It is this wide range that also leads to the associated issues of distraction, disruption and possible behavioural or ethical concerns which have so concerned education professionals. These issues too are introduced.

In Chapters 3 and 4, to set the current scene for the reader, I present case study examples of the range of mobile learning initiatives that have occurred within the past few years in schools in different countries across the globe. These are organised as to whether they occur inside the classroom, outside class or, perhaps most usefully of all for the classroom teacher, bringing the outside, inside. For having students use mobile devices to deliver and/or capture task and context-relevant information at a particular location and then use that data to support a future lesson enables teachers to make the most of learning opportunities in authentic contexts. It does seem rather that science teachers have a head start in mobile learning here as many science curricula internationally involve students in considerable amounts of fieldwork which has always been supported with cameras, probes and other data logging devices. However, I have tried to include examples that represent a wider range of taught subjects. They include both teachers’ own reports written up and published online for sharing with other practitioners and accounts of educational research-based initiatives taken from published academic journal papers or books.

Chapter 3 focuses on the background to using mobile devices in primary (elementary) school classrooms with younger students. At this age nearly all school-based mobile learning initiatives result from school- or district-based provision of mobile devices such as tablet computers like the iPad. Though, that said, only this week, I received a copy of the international journal Technology, Pedagogy and Education which includes a case study of the implementation of iPod Touches on a one-to-one basis in a Scottish primary school (Cornelius and Shanks, 2017). The researchers found that the students, by and large, used the devices sensibly and teachers’ initial concerns about devices distracting students were not substantiated. The iPod Touches were quickly assimilated into existing classroom practice and the teachers’ expectations in terms of them offering opportunities for resource provision, interactive learning and extension activities were fulfilled. However, some technical issues with the Wi-Fi provision remained and the hope that the initiative would lead to greater parental engagement with the children’s’ work was not realised. Teachers rarely set homework tasks that required the iPods and many students reported that they did not take the device home because they had an alternative device available there (Cornelius and Shanks, 2017). This study is an excellent example of the current ‘glass half full or glass half empty’ state of mobile learning in schools: it’s nearly but not quite there and people’s own views colour how they see it.

Chapter 4, which addresses mobile learning initiatives in secondary schools (middle, high and junior high schools), also includes bring your own device (BYOD) initiatives where schools capitalise on the increasing accessibility of using students’ own mobile devices. Mobile phones have become widely available; World Bank data from 2015 shows an average 96.8% of the global population as having a cell phone subscription (World Bank, 2015). Though of course this is an average where people in some countries have more than one phone and, in others, none. The mean percentage of cell phone subscriptions per individual reported by the World Bank for high-income countries is 124% and, for low-income countries, it is 60%. In respect of children and young people it is most likely to be a parent or carer paying the phone bill; however, in Denmark, for example, a survey on behalf of the Groupe Speciale Mobile Association (GSMA) found over 80% of 9 year olds reported using smartphones (GSMA, 2015). This figure does illustrate one issue readers of this book need to bear in mind for, like some of the data sources used to evidence further chapters, GSMA could not be said to be entirely impartial. It is a trade body that represents the interests of mobile operators worldwide. However, even nonpartisan groups report high numbers of people with access to mobile phones; in 2016 the Pew Research Center calculated the global median average rate of ownership to be 88% (Pew Research Center, 2016). In addition, an earlier survey for the same centre had 73% of 2,000 US middle and high school teachers reporting that they and/or their students use their mobile phones in the classroom or to complete assignments (Purcell et al., 2013).

Chapters 3 and 4 also highlight differences between this BYOD model and providing tablets such as iPads on an ‘organisation provided device’ (OPD) model. There is much debate as to pros and cons of each; however, ultimately it depends on the school and its circumstances. Some initiatives whether BYOD or OPD have gone spectacularly wrong and in several cases the media has played a key role in magnifying individual concerns. For example, Male and Burden (2014) report an attempt to enable iPad purchase by parents for their children through a leasing scheme which fell foul of adverse media coverage based on the notion that education should remain free to students. Similarly, in New Zealand, Maas (2011) reports on the media headlines made across the country after a school told parents of all their Year 9 students that they needed to purchase an iPad 2. Another OPD initiative that made headlines was what has become known as the Los Angeles iPad debacle. Set up as a civil rights initiative designed to provide low-income students with devices available to their wealthier peers (Blume, 2015), the accompanying story of how insufficient technical planning for the hardware support networks and lack of engagement with the teachers and students who were to use the devices demonstrates well how mobile learning initiatives can go wrong.

In order to address this issue Chapters 5 and 6 discuss good practice in evaluating mobile learning and the necessity for accompanying teacher professional development with the aim of ensuring initiatives set off on the right foot. Chapter 5 focuses on how researchers have tackled the challenges arising when trying to follow learners, their learning activities and to identify any impact of the learning across locations within and beyond the school. As Sharples (2009) points out, such learning opportunities may involve multiple participants in different locations and who are using a variety of personal and institutional technologies that include home or classroom computers as well as tablets or phones. Nor does good practice have to involve an external evaluator; Kim (2014) found that teachers experienced in teaching with iPads regarded the ability to evaluate as a pedagogical skill needed to determine the usability of the iPads through assessing both teaching as a process and learning as an outcome. With this focus on ensuring good, or at least effective, practice Chapter 5 also includes an account of the learning theory principles that underpin the ways in which the different tools and functions on internet-connected mobile devices can support learning. These centre on the active, situated, authentic and visual learning opportunities often associated with the constructivist approach plus a greater role for the autonomous learner (with their device). Such principles are mirrored in the associated teaching practices and the three key pedagogical principles for mobile learning – collaboration, personalisation and authenticity put forward by Kearney et al. (2012) – are subsequently introduced.

Chapter 6 aims to exemplify the professional development needed for teachers so as to ensure their effectiveness in the case of a mobile learning initiative being introduced to a school together with any foreseeable challenges. So many research studies include the conclusion that further and often better training for the teachers involved would have made a big difference in how a school-based mobile learning initiative was received and implemented. It includes examples of professional development with both preservice teachers and experienced professionals faced with what is likely to be a profound change to their practice. Interestingly, O’Bannon and Thomas (2015) showed from a survey of 245 preservice teachers in the Midwest US that almost half the preservice teachers supported the use of mobile phones in the classroom whereas a quarter did not, leaving approximately one-third who reported they were uncertain. The preservice teachers perceived many features and/or functions of mobile phones as being useful in the classroom, but they identified access to the internet, clicker (classroom response system) capabilities, use of educational apps and use as an e-book reader as the most valuable. They perceived cheating, disruptions, cyberbullying and accessing inappropriate content as major barriers to the use of mobile phones in the classroom. These issues are all tackled in more detail in Chapter 8 of this book but first, what about the ethical considerations involved in using (and quite probably monitoring) mobile devices in the classroom?

Chapter 7 introduces the range of ethical questions that have impinged on mobile learning researchers’ and practising teachers’ concerns as they realise the extent of the opportunities afforded by mobile learning devices to merge public and private, real and virtual, home and school in what are hopefully ‘seamless’ (Milrad et al., 2013) learning opportunities. These concerns include boundary crossing for, as Pimmer and Gröhbiel (2013) note, mobile devices are easily carried between contexts, enabling information more usually restricted to one context to be accessed in another. Also privacy – as boundaries are crossed there are opportunities for teachers, or researchers observing students using their personal mobile devices, to infringe privacy. There is also ownership of data: whose data is on the mobile device or on the server and who owns it? This is a particular concern in respect of ownership of images and music and the need to obtain permissions from third parties. Then there is accessibility: students from different backgrounds may have more trouble than others sourcing a device or fielding data costs, and students’ own awareness of their device capabilities such as what data is being logged by the different apps and who can view it. The chapter goes on to discuss support for teachers to address these concerns, firstly in the form of developing policy guidelines and secondly in the form of involving them in using ethics frameworks to generate their own scenario-based professional development.

Having a clear, up-to-date and well-communicated policy in place seems obvious; however, unless all stakeholders have signed up to it, it may well be a rod for the school’s back. One target group, in my experience though, are clearly mindful of school guidelines and rules and that is student teachers. In an early exploration of the role of PDAs (personal digital assistants) in supporting learning to teach I found that the trainees were reluctant to use them as their students were banned by the schools from using mobile phones that were similar in appearance. So why are mobile phones banned, whether by the school, the district or even some countries such as Brunei and Sri Lanka? Chapter 8 discusses the issues of misbehaviour too often associated with mobile devices which range from small-scale disruption to active cyberbullying and include their potential use for cheating and downloading inappropriate material such as pornography. These issues, fed by all too frequent headlines in the media about students uploading and sharing images from the classroom, or downloading inappropriate material to show others in class, quite possibly lie at the heart of our difficulty in developing teaching with the support of mobile technologies. As Thomas (2008) points out, school personnel ban things they believe a) encourage students to adopt improper moral values or b) waste time that should be spent pursuing the school’s learning goals. While both of these can be applied to the case of mobile phones teachers have not always had effective support or training for mobile learning.

One major factor in school-based teaching that teachers often prioritise over learning about new tools and pedagogies is the current assessment regime. Clearly, teachers internationally need to focus on preparing their students for their country’s na...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Title
• Copyright
• Dedication
• Contents
• Foreword
• 1 Introduction to this book
• 2 Introducing mobile learning and the associated issues
• 3 Current and recent mobile learning teaching and learning initiatives in primary schools
• 4 Current and recent mobile learning teaching and learning initiatives in secondary schools
• 5 Evaluating mobile learning, sustainability and underpinning theory
• 6 Teacher professional development and initial teacher education in mobile learning
• 7 Ethical considerations arising in school-based mobile learning
• 8 Behaviour matters in mobile learning
• 9 Assessing mobile learning
• 10 Recommendations for teaching via mobile learning opportunities and future scenarios
• References
• Index