ELI Spring Focus
Abilene Christian University: William Rankin and Kyle Dickson (English profs)
Developing a way of explaining/storytelling to explain how mobility & collaboration would change classroom structure (day in the life short story and video (15 min))
Brought faculty in early; did interest meeting (70% of faculty showed up); 42 faculty funded and 14 were Mobile Fellows; Got them to faculty to get them comfortable before deploying to students
Low hanging fruit: content (events in local area and on campus; quick checks for balances; dashboard for classes on Google Calendar; faculty interacting through calendar and email); other schools: GPS buses route tracking, webcams, etc
Move beyond one way content delivery (though faculty are still central): collaboration and communication
Initial apps:
- Distribution of files, Xythos (in class and out of class document launching) like MobileMe and Dropbox; access to content native file formats accessible *
- Drawing student voices in class: nanoTools (self-built) Like Hotseat, Connect Yard (backchannel)
- Polls: Turning Tech polling devices/clickers
- Third party developer collaboration (emantras' Mobile Livewire)
Making students creators as well as consumers Had had previous innovation with early adopter faculty who were dissatisfied w/current LMS and were using Web 2.0 tools (WordPress for updating textbooks and conversation around it, etc) WP Touch was mobile app for WordPress; blogs used for sharing thesis statements and immediate, posting examples, authoring content and sharing media; engaging students before class and outside class showcase
Used Posterous or Dropeo (can leave a podcast like you can leave a voicemail)
Partner with open development communities
Promising platforms: Google Wave, FB, Twitter
Places doing cool stuff: Princetonstudy on communication collaboration, Duke
Students don't want to be text messaged by their professors
mLearning Assessment
Teacher perspective not instructional designer or technologist * Assessment: Course objectives: how can I make them more effective with mobile learning (not just tech looking for a solution)
- Pedagogy: mLeanring can support: exploration observation social learning evidence based and experiential learning
- Technology: Application of tech Lots of research international education
Types of Research
- Pedagogical: Vavoula G & Sharples M. (2008) Challenges in Evaluatnig Mobile learning (systematic, life cycle approach) A 3 level approach
- More empirical data driven research (pro and con on mobile learning; still incomplete); primarily distance education
- Not research but institutional examples of commitment and pilot testing The Pedagogical Perspectives of MobileLearning Not just pre and post tests Flashcard programs: Anki, iFlipr, etc.