In my talk today at Bath Spa I set out to touch on key aspects of mobile learning, what is mobile learning and why we might be taking the time to care. Below are my supporting notes:
What is mobile learning
- If you read nothing else, the JISC Mobile Learning infokit is a great body of work to get you started
- It isn’t just about wheeling out devices, it is about seeking ways to enhance our teaching and learning by taking advantage of the opportunity and constraints
- Mobility of people with devices opens new doors
- Context is king
- There are 100s of devices (demo’ed 3 tablets) and there can be social pressure on students to get the devices everybody else has
- Mobile learning is leading to transformation in the classroom AND institutions are having to address this. Many institutions are are starting to address this with steering groups, research and initiatives such as “mobile clinics“.
Why Mobile learning?
- Mobile learning isn’t one thing but many different interwoven ideas and approached. The ‘Visitors & Residents’ principle is worth knowing about
- According to the Horizon Report 2011 (and watching students/staff on site) mobile is upon us.
- The HEA have a great collection of case studies from across the sector in Making mobile learning work: case studies of practice
- The web has matured and works well across platforms, the ibis reader for ebooks is one such example
Further signposts
- Book/free online – Weller, M (2011), The Digital Scholar, Bloomsbury Academic – chapter 14
- Ewan McIntosh blog posts tagged ‘mobile’
- LukeW has written extensively about designing for mobile first.
- JISC Mobile Learning programmes and activity