Considerations of Mobile Learning - Assignment 1

Education 3.0 is a connectivist, heutagogical approach to teaching and learning.  The teachers, learners, networks, connections, media, resources, tools create a unique entity that has the potential to meet individual learners’, educators’, and even societal needs.  Many resources for Education 3.0 are literally freely available for the taking. (Gerstein, J. 2013)

Mobile learning makes it possible to make Education 3.0 a reality rather than just a goal by providing the tools and connections that give learners the ability to take more control of their learning journey in a global context. Learning can become more personally meaningful and engaging with students being creators of knowledge rather than just consumers of knowledge. The table below shows how the use of mobile learning platforms can progress the evolution of the changing educational environment. By enabling learning to occur anywhere, anytime and with anyone, learning can be truly connectivist, autonomous and self-determined.

Moravec, J. 2008

In my personal teaching context, there is the recognition that digital pedagogy needs to be embraced and that mobile learning platforms are one mechanism to further this. There are challenges, such as teacher knowledge and up skilling as well as the investment in suitable hardware and infrastructure. The challenge of teacher capability is being addressed by considerable energy being devoted to Education Queensland's secure online Learning Place, with resources and professional development opportunities being offered and the showcasing of progressive schools. As schools gain access to greater capacity bandwidth, they will be able to take advantage of digital learning environments. Now we need to harness the capability of the digital natives, our students, to move towards Education 3.0.

The Mobile Learning Infokit identifies tangible benefits of mobile learning. I have explored the following 3 considerations:

• portable-allows anywhere, anytime learning
• bite-sized e-learning resources can be delivered to learners 
• promotes active learning

Haiku Deck was used to create a synthesis of mobile apps that address the above benefits and considerations of digital pedagogy.

Mobile Learning Considerations - Created with Haiku Deck, presentation software that inspires

Portable-allows anywhere, anytime learning
The use of an app called Slomocam can be used to video students involved in a physical education activity such as a soccer match. This recording can then be viewed in slow motion to enable an analysis of player positioning and team strategies while making learning more personalised and authentic.

Bite-sized e-learning resources can be delivered to learners

An excellent and student friendly app is Explain Everything that can be used to create tutorials for later viewing or that can be uploaded to a LMS to 'flip the classroom'. Native functions of iPads are maximised within this app, as the touch screen capability and inbuilt microphone are used to create instructional videos. The design of this program is very intuitive so that it can be used with relative ease by both teachers and students. Explain Everything can be used to demonstrate how to use other apps, as in this artefact, where a video tutorial is created explaining how to use Snap Seed to edit images with different effects before students use the app independently or collaboratively to edit images to be used in a class project. 

Promotes active learning
When students are involved in activities whereby they are engaged and assimilating knowledge and skills, they are more likely to remember the content and skills and be able to transfer this to new learning situations. This process of active learning can be achieved when students design and create digital stories.
Adobe Voice is a web-based application used to create digital stories. With the provision of various templates, a wide range of clipart and copyright free images accessible within the app, it provides a user-friendly interface that can be used by the youngest students right through to experienced professionals. A great advantage of this app is the access to copyright-free images. It is possible to easily locate suitable images without needing to be concerned with copyright or attribution, so students can quickly create visually stimulating stories. At this stage, the stories need to be accessed online, so thought will need to be given as to the best method for sharing the digital presentation. One suitable method is to email the link or make it available in a blog (or similar tool) for sharing.

Demonstrating Learning Adobe Voice Digital Story

Digital pedagogies move the focus from ICT tools and skills to a way of working in a digital world.

(Education Queensland, 2008)

In order for the benefits of mobile devices to be realised in an educational context, it is necessary to ensure the focus of mobile learning is on how the learner uses the device and the opportunities they can provide rather than on the actual device. For this to occur, teachers need to change their pedagogy to ensure that learning is personalised, authentic, collaborative and considers the global context. By utilising the native features of mobile devices, considering these benefits and limitations and choosing apps carefully, while ensuring they are appropriate for the learning context, it is possible to harness the seamless benefits of mobile learning. That is, of being able to smoothly move from and between learning experiences and contexts. (Looi et al, 2010 cited in Gruber, Cooper and Voigt, 2012)

NB: All of these artefacts were created using an Apple iPad. The blog post was created on my laptop. I have Blogger installed on my iPad but it doesn't have the full functionality of the computer platform, so I made the decision to still use my laptop to prepare my blog post while embedding or uploading my iPad created artefacts.

Gerstein, J. (2013) Education 3.0 and the pedagogy (andragogy, heutagogy) of mobile learning, retrieved 31st July 2014 from http://usergeneratededucation.wordpress.com/2013/05/13/education-3-0-and-the-pedagogy-andragogy-heutagogy-of-mobile-learning/

Moravec, J. (2008) Toward society 3.0: a new paradigm for 21st century education, retrieved 31st July 2014 from http://www.slideshare.net/moravec/toward-society-30-a-new-paradigm-for-21st-century-education-presentation?type=powerpoint

Education Queensland. (2008), What are digital pedagogies? - digital pedagogies - digital pedagogies professional learning network, retrieved 20th September 2013 from https://www.learningplace.com.au/deliver/content.asp?pid=41886 

Gruber, M, Cooper, A and Voigt, C. 2012. Seamless learning (u-learn), retrieved 3rd August 2014 from http://www.learningfrontiers.eu/?q=category/tags/seamless-learning