It is great to see some new books on mobile learning. Recently there was a lot of buzz about Mobile Learning: Transforming the Delivery of Education and Training edited by Mohamed Ally (March 2009). I had read a couple chapters and got back to it this last week on my Kindle while travelling.While useful, I was disappointed that most of the examples were from the early and mid-2000’s.
Having followed and participated in mobile learning since 1996, I see very clear stages and believe that we should now be looking forward at the potential of this very powerful opportunity.
We began with standalone devices (PDA) that could be connected to a single computer for a single person. Once these devices were combined with a cell phone, communication opened up. With today’s capabilities to seamlessly move from cellular to Wi-Fi, collaboration opens many more doors. Location-based context and tagging, sensors and feedback, recognition and specialized apps now open up our imaginations and provide powerful learning opportunities not even available on a desktop.
There are three new books just published that appear to be current and looking ahead. I have just started reviewing them, but wanted to share in case you are looking to add to your reading lists on mobile learning:
- New technologies, new pedagogies: Mobile learning in higher education from the University of Wollongong includes faculty development, specific discipline examples and design principles. This is available as a free PDF download.
- Mobile Learning Communities: Creating New Educational Futures by Patrick Danaher, Beverley Moriarty, Geoff Danaher, a Routledge publication covering communities, along with other topics such as globalization, lifelong learning, multiliteracies, and sustainability; concluding with creating new educational futures.
- Researching Mobile Learning: Frameworks, Tools and Research Designs from Peter Lang Publishing Group, which sets out the issues and requirements for mobile learning research and presents efforts to specify appropriate theoretical frameworks, research methods and tools.
What have you found? What are you reading about mobile learning? Please share in the comments.
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Just ran across another book (also from 2005) entitled Kukulska-Hulme - Mobile Learning: A Handbook For Educators and Trainers." You can download it at http://4ebooks.org/2009/06/11/mobile-learning-a-handbook-for-educators-and-trainers.html
ReplyDeleteA research on mobile learning was conducted in Brazil, the results are available here: http://www.mobilelearning.org.br
ReplyDeleteSome mobile learning publications free for download include:
ReplyDeleteBig Issues in Mobile Learning
http://www.lsri.nottingham.ac.uk/msh/papers/BIG_ISSUES_REPORT_PUBLISHED.pdf
(a report from a European workshop of mobile learning researchers on major issues related to mobile learming)
Literature Review in Mobile Technologies and Learning: Futurelab Report 11
http://www.futurelab.org.uk/resources/documents/lit_reviews/Mobile_Review.pdf
Proceedings of mLearn 2007 conference, Melbourne, Australia
http://www.mlearn2007.org/files/mLearn_2007_Conference_Proceedings.pdf
The proceedings of the mLearn 2008 conference should be available for download at www.mlearn2008.org but the link is currently broken