Mobile devices for learning: Seven things to remember (plus or minus two)

12-13 November 2009The views expressed in this talk are Professor Cook’s and do not

represent those of ALT or Becta.

John Cook

Chair ALT Research Committee

&

Learning Technology Research Institute London Metropolitan University

Part of:

Successful deployment: networked handheld devices for learning and

teaching.

A good practice workshop for schools, colleges, universities, work-based learning and community education.

12-13 November 2009, National College for Leadership for Schools and Children’s Services in Nottingham

Email: john.cook@londonmet.ac.uk Home page: http://staffweb.londonmet.ac.uk/~cookj1/ Blog: http://blogs.londonmet.ac.uk/tel

Twitter: http://twitter.com/johnnigelcook Slideshare: http://www.slideshare.net/johnnigelcook Skype: johnnigelcook Google Wave: johnnigelcook@googlewave.com Blip.fm: http://blip.fm/johnnigelcook

Possible hashtag:#althhl09?

johnnigelcook

7(+/-2)1. New tools have often got bad press in the past.2. In the present we are seeing fragmentation of

literacy abilities. 3. BUT informal and formal learning better

understood. This may hold a solution for on-site and off-campus learning integration.

4. Back to the future: Augmented Contexts for Development.

5. The future “is necessarily less predictable than the past”!

1. New tools have often got bad press in the past

People thought the first printing press was an instrument of the devil that would spawn unauthorised versions of the bible.David Crystal (Guardian, 2008), author of ‘Txtng: the gr8db8’ (Crystal, 2008)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Printing_press

The telephone created fears of a breakdown in family life, with people no longer speaking directly to one another.

http://www.solarnavigator.net/inventors/inventor_images/alexander_graham_bell_1876_speaking_into_telephone.jpg

And radio and television raised concerns about brain-washing.

http://oak.cats.ohiou.edu/~postr/MRT/Tour1.htm

http://blog.lib.umn.edu/mors0106/architecture/Television.jpg

Mobile phones can damage your health?

txt spk is responsible for bad spelling and moral decay?

As always there is more to it than meets the eye …

2. In the present we are seeing fragmentation of ‘literacy’ abilities

• The results of PISA on reading competence suggest a fragmenting of literacy performace in terms of social cohesion.

• Except for in a few countries, for example in Finland, around 18% of 15 year old students tend to be unable to read texts (OECD, 2004, p. 5).

• This in the sense of comprehension: finding information in a paragraph, interpreting the information and reflecting on or evaluating it.

3. BUT informal and formal learning better understood. This may hold a solution for on-site

and off-campus learning integration.

True Yorkshiremen know all about informal leaning

A possible framework : “Socio-Cultural Ecology” (Pachler, Bachmair and Cook, in press)

Pachler, Bachmair and Cook

Mobile Learning: Structures, Agency, Practices.

New York: Springer.

Due Feb 2010.http://www.springer.com/education/learning+&+instruction/book/978-1-4419-0584-0

• Grounds readers by offering – theoretical and conceptual models – analytical framework for understanding the issues

• Recommendations for specialised resources • Practical examples of mobile learning

– in formal (school) as well as informal educational settings

• Particularly with at-risk students

Socio-Cultural Ecology

• Agency (capacity to act on the world)– formation of identity and subjectivity– environment a potential resource for learning

• Cultural practices (routines in stable situations) – Institutional settings, be they school, university, the work place

etc.– Media use in everyday life (includes informal/non-formal)

• Structures (digital tools and media) – educational institutions no longer define alone what learning and

knowledge are and they are certainly no longer the only, even the main location where learning and knowledge can be accessed and takes place.

– From push to pull, change of mass communication and media convergence

Parent

Rugby union fan

Kids

E-Learning project leader

ResearchSelf taught bassplayer

PhD students

John

Play5 aside football

Formal and/or informal learning

HE

LIFE

WarningFormal learning did this to

me!

7 years later & informal learning – Mr Cool at the ICA!

7 years later & informal learning!

2 years ago work and to kids finally caught up with to me!

1 year ago - resurfacing

The nature of learning is being augmented and accelerated by

new digital tools and media, particularly by mobile devices

and the networks and structures to which they connect people.

RLO CETL mLOs for ‘on-site’ and

‘off-campus’ learning

(EG see Bradley et al. 2007; Smith et al, 2007, Cook et al., 2008; Bradley et al. 2009; Holley et al., 2009; Pachler et al., in press).

Getting ready for off-site learning Using scalable open source GPS

enabled software

Learner story

“Well we were walking around and observing the theatres of the event and trying to get the most images [that] we could get, and videos, and even sounds. We tried first to observe with our own eyes a little, to pick up what we thought was important for our presentation, and for our observation of the event.”

[play Elli clip]

(Cook, Pachler and Bradley, 2008; Pachler, Cook, Bachmair, accepted)

CONTSENS

Smith, Cook and Pratt-Adams (2009)

“The information given was underlined by the 'experience' of the area and therefore given context in both past and present.”

““it was triggering my own thoughts and I was getting to think for myself about the area and the buildings.”

4. Back to the future: Augmented Contexts for Development

www.ukzn.ac.za/cae/pfi/sqd/lev.htm

Vygotsky proposed the Zone of Proximal Development

“It is the distance between the actual developmental level as determined by

independent problem solving and the level of potential problem solving as determined

through problem solving under adult guidance or in collaboration with more

capable peers.” (Vygotsky, 1978/1930, p. 86, my bold)

Qualitative analysis: process and explanatory perspective, looking at the inner features of the

situation (Cook, in press)

Screen shot of Carl Smith’s wire-frame movie reconstruction of Nine Alters (http://cistercians.shef.ac.uk/)

Students interacting @ Cistercian Chapel in CONTSENS

Temporal underpinning of Augmented Contexts for

Development is fundamental

5. The future “is necessarily less predictable than the past”!

www.teddave.org/end/index.html

What does the future hold?• Predicting the future can be problematic, lets hear from a

guru of communication on this … • [clip]• "I would not say that the future is necessarily less

predictable than the past. I think the past was not predictable when it started."

• The then Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld• There are seven things to remember about the future (plus

or minus two)!

7(+/-2)

References• Bradley, C., Cook, J., Haynes. R. and Smith, C. (2007). Multimedia

Learning Materials for Mobiles. Presentation at Handheld Learning Conference, Central Hall Westminster, London, October 10th–12th.

• Bradley, C., Haynes, R., Cook, J., Boyle, T. and Smith, C. (2009). Design and development of multimedia learning objects for mobile phones. In Mohamed, A. (ed) Mobile Learning in Education and Training. Athabasca University Press

• Cook, J. (2009). Mobile Phones as Mediating Tools Within a Responsive Context for Development. Workshop: Education in the Wild. Alpine Rendez-Vous, within the framework of the STELLAR Network of Excellence. December 3-4, Garmisch-Partenkirchen, Bavaria, Germany.

• Cook, J. (in press). Travelling Without Moving: Design-Based Research into Augmented Contexts for Development. Journal of Interactive Media in Education. Invited paper for special issue from the CALRG 30th Anniversary Day. Contact me for a copy.

• Cook, J., Pachler, N. and Bradley, C. (2008). Bridging the Gap? Mobile Phones at the Interface between Informal and Formal Learning. Journal of the Research Center for Educational Technology, Spring. Available at: http://www.rcetj.org/index.php/rcetj/article/view/34

References• Giddens, A. (1984). The Constitution of Society: Outline of the Theory of

Structuration. University of California Press. Reprint edition (January 1, 1986).

• Hall, S. (1997) (ed.). Representation. Cultural Representations and Signifying Practices. London: Sage.

• Crystal, D. (2008) Txtng: the gr8db8. Capital Books.• Guardian (2008) Gr8 db8r takes on linguistic luddites. Interview with David

Crystal by John Crace, 16th September. Available at: http://www.guardian.co.uk/education/2008/sep/16/academicexperts.languages, accessed 24th September 2008.

• Holley, D., Bradley, C. Greaves, L. and Cook, J. (2009). “You Can Take Out of it What you Want” – How Learning Objects Within Blended Learning Designs Encourage Personalised Learning. In John O’Donoghue (Ed.) Technology Supported Environment for Personalised Learning: Methods and Case Studies. IGI Global.

• OECD (2004) Messages from PISA 2000. Available at: http://www.oecd.org/dataoecd/31/19/34107978.pdf

References• Smith, C., Cook, J., Bradley, C. Gossett, R. and Haynes, R. (2007).

Enhancing Deep Learning in Sports Science: The Application of Rich Media Visualization Techniques in Mobile and Reusable Learning Objects. Full paper in proceedings of ED-MEDIA 2007 – World Conference on Educational Multimedia, Hypermedia & Telecommunications, June 25-29, Vancouver, Canada.

• Smith, C., Cook, J. and Pratt-Adams, S. (2009). Context Sensitive Mobile Learning: Designing a ‘Technoscape’ for Urban Planners. Mobile Learning, Barcelona, 26-28 February.

• Pachler, N., Cook, J. and Bachmair, B. (accepted). Appropriation of Mobile Phones and Learning. International Journal of Mobile and Blended Learning. To be published January 2010.

• Pachler, N., Bachmair, B. and Cook, J. (in press). Mobile Learning: Structures, Agency, Practices. New York: Springer. Feb 2010.

• Vygotsky, L. (1978 / 1930). Mind in society. The development of higher psychological processes. Edited by M. Cole et al., Cambridge, MA. Harvard University Press.