Mobile Learning

A Handbook for Educators and Trainers

John Traxler, Agnes Kukulska-Hulme

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2007
• eBook ISBN: 9781134247554
• Topic: Education
• Subtopic: Education General

Emphasising the issues of usability, accessibility, evaluation and effectiveness and illustrated by case studies drawn from contemporary projects from around the world, this book considers:

• the fundamentals of mobile technologies and devices
• the educational foundations of modern networked learning
• the issues that underpin mobile learning and make it accessible for all users
• the challenges of making mobile learning a substantial and sustainable component in colleges, universities and corporations
• implications and issues for the future.

Mobile Learning provides useful, authoritative and comprehensive guidance for professionals in higher and further education and trainers in the business sector who want to find out about the opportunities offered by new technologies to deliver, support and enhance teaching, learning and training.

Chapter 1

Introduction

Agnes Kukulska-Hulme

What is mobile learning?

‘Mobile learning’ is both a new concept and one that has some familiar connotations. It is certainly concerned with learner mobility, in the sense that learners should be able to engage in educational activities without the constraints of having to do so in a tightly delimited physical location. To a certain extent, learning outside a classroom or in various locations requires nothing more than the motivation to do so wherever the opportunity arises – from books, electronic resources, places and people. What is new in ‘mobile learning’ comes from the possibilities opened up by portable, lightweight devices that are sometimes small enough to fit in a pocket or in the palm of one’s hand. Typical examples are mobile phones (also called cellphones or handphones), smartphones, palmtops and handheld computers (Personal Digital Assistants or PDAs); Tablet PCs, laptop computers and personal media players can also fall within its scope. These devices can be carried around with relative ease and used for communication and collaboration, and for teaching and learning activities that are different from what is possible with other media.

We are beginning to see significant adoption of these technologies in further and higher education, in schools and the community, and in training and updating. They are having an impact on teaching, learning, and on the connections between formal and informal learning, work and leisure. They are extremely interesting for educators due to the low cost of many of these devices relative to desktop computers and the spontaneous and personal access they give to the vast educational resources of the Internet. When combined with wireless connectivity, learning activities can be monitored and coordinated between locations. However, the task of designing such activities and appropriate learner support is complex and challenging. The impacts of the new mobile technologies need to be appraised and evaluated. The purpose of this book is to promote and develop our collective understanding of these new possibilities. We will see how they have begun to be put into practice in education and training, and we will assess their impacts to date.

O’Malley et al. (2003) have defined mobile learning as taking place when the learner is not at a fixed, predetermined location, or when the learner ‘takes advantage of the learning opportunities offered by mobile technologies’ (2003: 6). Mobile learning has a range of attributes that might contribute to its definition: it can be spontaneous, personal, informal, contextual, portable, ubiquitous (available everywhere) and pervasive (so integrated with daily activities that it is hardly noticed). With these attributes, it has much in common with other types of e-learning on desktop computers, but with the advantages and drawbacks of more varied and changing locations, more immediate (‘anytime’) interaction, and smaller, often wireless devices. Just as e-learning wrestles with a dual identity – is it just learning, or is the ‘electronic’ aspect still important? – so mobile learning is partly about learning and partly about the breakthroughs of mobile computing and global marketing of mobile devices. It is rapidly becoming a credible and cost-effective component of on-line and distance learning and anyone developing courses in companies, universities and colleges must consider carefully what it has to offer.

Mobile devices everywhere

To read about mobile learning in the research literature is to enter a world of daunting technical terms and futuristic concepts. However, even for a non-technical person, some computing-related jargon is worth knowing. This includes: ‘ubiquitous’, ‘pervasive’ and ‘ambient’. These concepts introduce a certain perspective that should be understood in order to get an idea of the direction in which mobile learning is taking us.

‘Ubiquitous’ began to be used in computer science in the late 1980s, when questions were raised about how computers were embedded within the social framework of daily activity and how they related to the physical environment. Researchers were looking for a radical answer to what they perceived was wrong with the personal desktop computer. Recounting their story, Weiser et al. remember that the personal computer was considered to be:

… too complex and hard to use; too demanding of attention; too isolating from other people and activities; and too dominating as it colonized our desktops and our lives. We wanted to put computing back in its place, to reposition it into the environmental background, to concentrate on human-tohuman interfaces and less on human-to-computer ones.

(Weiser et al. 1999: 693)

If computers were ‘ubiquitous’, that is, available everywhere and part of our environment, it could be easier to concentrate on learning activities instead of computing hardware being the learner’s focus. The next logical step would be for the computing devices to become so small and so easily available in many locations that in a sense they would become invisible and intrude even less on the task in hand. What is more, once all devices were networked, information would only have to be entered once and would then be available whenever and wherever it was needed. ‘Pervasive’ computing aspires to this ideal:

We think of pervasive computing as a move from an interaction between an individual and a single device to an abundance of networked mobile and embedded computing devices that individuals and groups use across a variety of tasks and places.

(Dryer et al. 1999: 652)

Taking this even further, ‘ambient’ technology would be something like ambient temperature or sound – surrounding us completely and perhaps as natural as the air we breathe. For ambient learning to take place, buildings and public spaces would have to be ‘learning enhanced’: they would have to have devices or systems ready to respond to what is in the learner’s field of view, giving information about specific places or objects and enabling on-the-spot interactions. This kind of ambient technology, which is said to ‘augment’ the environment for learning, is being trialled in urban and natural environments (e.g. Weal et al. 2003; Fritz et al. 2004).

Mobile devices, whether embedded in the environment or carried around by their users, are redefining the nature of public and private spaces. Learning is becoming more personal, yet at the same time more connected to the surroundings and with more potential for connected, collaborative activity. There is a tension here that comes from the fact that most mobile devices in current use are not designed specifically for education or training but rather for personal (even individual) information management or personal communication largely within work contexts or home and one-to-one social use. The idea of making connections to the environment, to resources and communities or groups of people comes more from educational technology research and practice (e.g. Collis 1996; Preece 2000) and educational research on mobile communities (e.g. Frohberg 2002). It may also be seen in those projects that have the financial resources to design technology and learning spaces that meet specific target user requirements.

Practical mobile learning now and in the future

Although many examples of mobile learning come from computing research that aims to push the boundaries of knowledge and technical capability, there are also plenty of very interesting initiatives and trials resulting from the need to find solutions to practical needs or from seizing opportunities as they arise. Some technologies have already reached very high levels of availability and acceptance – this is the case for mobile phones in many parts of the world. Other devices will follow suit when they become cheaper, lighter, and perhaps when they are able to combine several communication and storage facilities in a single portable device. Educators and trainers can respond to this situation by exploring how these devices may be used for teaching and learning, while bearing in mind the various educational, personal, social and cost implications of such a move. We can also work toward the realization of a long-term vision for the development of institutions and training departments to take account of new staff and student development needs.

Mobile learning is now moving beyond short-term, small-scale pilot projects and is ready to tackle issues of scale, sustainability, accessibility, evaluation, cost-effectiveness and quality in the mainstream of education and training, blending with other forms of delivery and support. This book reflects on existing systems, technologies and pedagogies, addressing key issues such as accessibility and usability. It provides the conceptual framework to understand and evaluate the book’s broad range of case studies that show best practice from around the world. These case studies illustrate projects that use mobile devices to enhance and extend individual academic subjects, to provide students with general course support, as well as institution-wide initiatives forming part of a total integrated learning technology provision. The aim of including the case studies is to support teachers, lecturers, trainers, managers and staff developers in thinking through mobile learning in their own institutions, planning for both the present and the future. Throughout the book, we draw on examples and scenarios of how mobile technologies being developed now are starting to be used and may be used in the future.

Keeping up with developments

Mobile learning is an extremely fast-moving field that is both specialized and interwoven with daily life and work. Every day there are new developments and new facts and figures about device ownership and patterns of use that require us to stop and think about the implications. For example, according to one source, Hong Kong mobile users send an average of 23 text messages a month compared with 124 in China, 219 in Singapore and 466 in the Philippines (Textually.org 2004). What are the reasons for such differences – are they technical, economic, social or cultural? Many such questions remain unanswered.

To keep up with developments in this field, there is a growing pool of dedicated conferences, seminars and workshops. MLEARN began in 2002 and has become an annual event. Another regular dedicated event is the International Workshop on Mobile and Wireless Technologies in Education (WMTE). Other events have included The National Workshops and Tutorials on Handheld Computers in Universities and Colleges, held in the United Kingdom; The Social Science of Mobile Learning, held in Hungary; and the ICML (International Conference on Mobile Learning): New Frontiers and Challenges, held in Malaysia.

There have also been a rising number of references to mobile learning at generalist conferences such as Online Educa Berlin, the world’s largest international e-learning conference, and ED-MEDIA, the world conference on educational multimedia, hypermedia and telecommunications. Issues of usability and interaction with mobile devices are the focus of events such as the annual International Symposium on Human–Computer Interaction with Mobile Devices and Services. As academic learning becomes more integrated with workplace learning, we are also seeing a growing emphasis on collaborative ways of working and learning, including collaboration using mobile devices. Mobile technology can be used as a bridge between formal and informal learning. In the United States, mobile learning has been one of the key themes of the EDUCAUSE National Learning Infrastructure Initiative.

Aims, structure and target readers

We want to introduce mobile learning to a wide readership by making the topic accessible in spite of its associated technical jargon, and by giving it a certain structure. We offer in-depth treatments of mobile technologies, pedagogical approaches, usability and accessibility. A rich array of case studies illustrates how mobile technologies are being used and evaluated in a number of different learning situations. We then address the place of mobile learning strategies and projects within the wider institutional context, and finally we draw out some overall conclusions about the current aims and state of mobile learning and possible future developments.

This book is intended for lecturers, tutors, trainers, developers, managers and researchers in universities and colleges and in commercial training. Some may be tasked with showing others how to use mobile technologies for teaching and learning, or explaining key benefits and concepts. Many are increasingly aware of the educational potential of handheld computers and mobile communications devices and may know of the growing number of studies, trials and pilots that are currently exploring this potential across a range of settings and subjects. This book draws on the most illuminating and imaginative of these in order to provide a comprehensive examination of mobile learning in further and higher education and training. We aim to provide interested professionals in education and training (‘teachers’, for short) with both a well-informed grasp of the principles and concepts and a familiarity with the breadth of current experience and practice. The book does not assume any technical knowledge of mobile devices. A glossary of terms is provided for convenience.

Readers will probably position themselves differently in their own definitions of mobile learning, as indeed do the various contributors to this book: there are many ways to conceptualize, theorize about and experiment with mobile learning. We hope that this book addresses key aspects of mobile learning that need to be understood, as well as offering a range of ‘entry points’ to this topic according to readers’ preferences, interests and needs.

Bibliography

Collis, B. (1996) Tele-learning in a Digital World: The Future of Distance Learning, London: International Thomson Computer Press.

Dryer, D.C., Eisbach, C. and Ark, W.S. (1999) At what cost pervasive? A social computing view of mobile computing systems, IBM Systems Journal – Pervasive Computing, 38(4): 652–76.

Fritz, G., Seifert, C., Luley, P., Paletta, L. and Almer, A. (2004) Mobile Vision for Ambient Learning in Urban Environments, MOBILEARN 2004 – Learning Anytime Everywhere, Rome, 5–6 July 2004. On-line. Available HTTP http://www.mobilearn.org/download/events/mlearn_2004/presentations/Paletta.pdf (accessed 14 October 2004).

Frohberg, D. (2002) Communities – the MOBIlearn perspective. Workshop on Ubiquitous and Mobile Computing for Educational Communities: Enriching and Enlarging Community Spaces, International Conference on Communities and Technologies, Amsterdam, 19 September 2003. On-line. Available HTTP http://www.idi.ntnu.no/~divitini/umocec2003/Final/frohberg.pdf (accessed 14 October 2004).

National Statistics, UK (2004) Oftel Residential Survey. On-line. Available HTTP http://www.statistics.gov.uk/STATBASE/ssdataset.asp?vlnk=7202 (accessed 14 October 2004).

O’Malley, C., Vavoula, G., Glew, J.P., Taylor, J., Sharples, M. and Lefrere, P. (2003) MOBIlearn WP4 – Guidelines for Learning/Teaching/Tutoring in a Mobile Environment. On-line. Available HTTP http://www.mobilearn.org/download/results/guidelines.pdf (accessed 19 November 2004).

Preece, J. (2000) Online Communities: Designing Usability, Supporting Sociability, Chichester: Wiley.

Textually.org (2004) Hong Kong children top mobile phone ownership in Asia. On-line. Available HTTP http://www.textually.org/textually/archives/004862.htm (accessed 14 October 2004).

Weal, M.J., Michaelides, D.T., Thompson, M.K. and De Roure, D.C. (2003) The Ambient Wood Journals – Replaying the Experience, Proceedings of ACM Hypertext ’03, 14th Conference on Hypertext and Hypermedia 2003, Nottingham, UK. On-line. Available HTTP http://www.equator.ac.uk/PublicationStore/p307–weal.pdf (accessed 14 October 2004).

Weiser, M., Gold, R. and Brown, J.S. (1999) The origins of ubiquitous computing research in the late 1980s, IBM Systems Journal – Pervasive Computing, 38(4): 693–6.

Chapter 2

Mobile technologies and systems

Jon Trinder

This chapter will provide the basic context and framework for understanding the technical environment and systems within which mobile learning operates. It will look at emerging and established systems, especially their technical characteristics, performance and connectivity. There is a glossary at the back of the book that provides additional simple explanations of many of the relevant concepts and more technical explanations are also available (Sharples and Beale 2003; Burkhardt et al. 2002).

We are primarily concerned with Personal Digital Assistants (PDAs) and mobile phones or smartphones, but there are many other handheld device types that share their characteristics in size, form or function. These range from simple single-purpose devices, such as audio players, to multipurpose devices that typically combine a PDA or phone with other functionalities such as cameras and MP3 players. Figure 2.1 shows there are many different functions that may be combined into a mobile device.

We will start by examining these two popular handheld devices – the mobile phone and the PDA.

Mobile phones

Probably the most popular and widely owned handheld device is the mobile phone. Even the most basic phones provide simple Per...

Table of contents

• Cover Page
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Figures
• Tables
• Contributors
• Series editor’s foreword
• Acknowledgements
• Chapter 1: Introduction
• Chapter 2: Mobile technologies and systems
• Chapter 3: Mobile teaching and learning
• Chapter 4: Mobile usability and user experience
• Chapter 5: Accessibility and mobile learning
• Chapter 6: Case studies
• Chapter 7: Learning Italian via mobile SMS
• Chapter 8: Evaluating a low cost, wirelessly connected PDA for delivering VLE functionality
• Chapter 9: Expect the unexpected
• Chapter 10: KNOWMOBILE
• Chapter 11: Training Perioperative Specialist Practitioners
• Chapter 12: Whether it’s m-learning or e-learning, it must be ME learning
• Chapter 13: Reading course materials in e-book form and on mobile devices
• Chapter 14: Handheld composing
• Chapter 15: The Student Learning Organiser
• Chapter 16: Tuning in to students’ mobile learning needs
• Chapter 17: University of South Dakota Palm Initiative
• Chapter 18: The future of learning at IBM
• Chapter 19: Institutional issues
• Chapter 20: Conclusions
• Glossary