Day 1 What When Where..
I haven’t done any m-learning on my cell phone because I find the device a little too small. This is with the exception of learing to develop an application for display on a cell phone but then I only used it to view the finished product.
For mobility overall I do alternate between my Iphone and Ipad. My Iphone has become my email, voice, and text machine. I rarely use voice anymore as almost everyone I know, except for older family members, seem to communicate through text or email. This is outside of work of course but I’m not on a work contract right now so voice calls are minimal.
I was really happy that the Ipad came out just when I was starting the MET program. I use my Ipad is for reading PDFs, surfing the net, social media and m-learning which includes all access to MET classes and posting interactivity. Although I couldn’t participate in a Wimba exercise that was required for one class last year. I should also mention that I connect my Ipad to my Iphone because I was too cheap to buy the 3G model.
I also use a laptop at home but it has ceased to act as a mobile device and has become instead a replacement desktop. It’s funny but I consider the laptop too heavy because I have gotten used to the lightness of the Ipad.
If I was without my ipad for some reason then I would probably try to use my Iphone for all the things I use my IPad for. I do have lynda.com installed but I’ve never used it on the phone.
– Julie
Posted in: Week 11: Mobiles
David William Price 8:18 pm on November 14, 2011 Permalink | Log in to Reply
Thanks for your post.
Once again, you fit the stats for smartphone owners… you rarely use it for voice calls. I find that tendency very interesting… are we losing our comfort with talking to people directly? How does that affect our ability to maintain relationships? I think of the “check in” call with my partner… I use it as an excuse to ask questions, listen to her voice tone, etc. I can’t imagine communicating mostly through text (I’ve never sent one).
Do you carry your iPad with you everywhere you go? When you’re on the go, how do you look up performance support information like weather, Google, Wikipedia, reviews, and maps?
Have you ever found yourself in a problem situation needing a relatively small, simple answer or memory refresh? Have you ever used the audio, video or photo recording functions of your device to capture something in the field to share with people either in real time or asynchronously to illustrate a concept?
If someone else paid for your data plan, and you looked at m-learning as an interactive performance support and data capture device in the field… how might you use your iPhone differently?
Julie S 11:24 am on November 15, 2011 Permalink | Log in to Reply
Hi David,
Actually I am a lot more social these days than I ever was without my mobile devices and believe it or not, I’m less stressed.
I don’t use my phone for voice because I prefer face to face get togethers. I am not replacing voice with text or email. I’m using the technologies quite differently. I’m often using them to organize face to face get togethers.
A good example is coordinating cycling get togethers with groups of friends. I tend to cycle a lot, both on the mountain and road (when not tied to my computer for the MET Program). This summer I was fortunate enough to be able to take August off before coming here to MET full time to finish off my degree. I wasn’t sure if I would be able to get the time off so I hadn’t made any plans. However, through email and texting friends throughout the month I was able to string together a set of cycling trips with 5 different groups of friends and family which took me from about August 6th to September 6th as well as from Vancouver, to Whistler, to Pemberton, to Vernon, to Nelson, to Red Deer, AB, to Oakridge, Oregon, and then back home again just in time for the first day of classes.
Because I was travelling (and ad-hoc travelling at that) I think it would have been extremely time consuming and very unlikely that I would have been able to pull this off just by using voice calls. Expense of long distance calls (at the time I didn’t have Skype on my cell) and the extra time it takes – especially when there are multiple people involved.
As far as your questions about the IPAD. Yes, I try to take it everywhere (except on the bike) and guaranteed that if I decide not to take it one day or forget it that I regret it. Even if I have my cell phone it’s not the same. I use the device for all the things you mentioned – Google maps, Wikipedia, reviews, even recipes if I’m at Granville Island and am picking up something fresh for a nice meal. On the cell, while on the bike trails, I use a mapping software built for the trails which tells me where I am on the trail which helps tremendously when we get lost as we sometimes do.
I use the camera on my Iphone extensively. I probably take at least a photo a day and send it to one friend or another to share an experience that I’m having. My friends do the same.– this is again where text and email win out over voice.
The good thing about text over phone is that you can be really quick and dispense with the pleasantries… save those for when you are in person – which for me is when it really counts – forget the phone line.
In response to your question about someone else paying for my data plan. It would be nice but wouldn’t change anything. I already have a 6 GB data plan which I have never exceeded and can’t imagine at the moment how I would – having said that companies are always coming up with new ways that make me use even more data!
Sorry for the long winded reply but hopefully this adds a little qualitative data to your quantitative stats.
– Julie
David William Price 11:59 am on November 15, 2011 Permalink | Log in to Reply
Thanks for that fantastic reply! I love the details.
One of the curious things about traditional learning is how sedentary it can be. How do you think you might use mobile to help students work in a more wide-ranging, rambling and collaborative manner… the way you do organizing cycling trips, checking maps, and sharing images? How might this affect their skills in teamwork, organization, self-regulation within authentic and situated experiences?
Julie S 1:46 pm on November 15, 2011 Permalink | Log in to Reply
Hi David,
In a word geocaching! Being an active person, I think traditional learning is way too sedentary. When my group was working on the gaming module I came across an article, Mobile Game Based Learning: Designing a mobile location based game by Sandra Schadenbauer in Austria. Schadenbauer talks about the issue of kids growing up with cell phones and games and argues that is time for academic institutions to join the game so to speak. She describes a conceptual model complete with illustrations about how to do it and integrate it with Moodle. She refers to the mobile Moodle as ‘MoMo’. The game is centred around a legend where the students engage in fighting ‘the devil’ in this case. In Schadenbauer case the game is centred on a historical location and related legend. I think the possibilities for this type of learning are really endless. As with all technologies though, this essay is already dated because it uses Flash, which as we now know is soon to be an artifact of the past.
Reference:
Schadenbauer, S. (2007). Mobile Game Based Learning: Designing a mobile location based game.