Day 4 Already?
wow, this week is flying past..or is it the engaging topic David?
I’ve been talking quite a bit at work with our IT department about this whole idea of mobile learning in our schools. We have so many hurdles to overcome in elementary and secondary schools – first, as has already been mentioned is the cost of data plans that would be needed – many of our kids have cell phones that parents keep on very small plans -ensuring that the phone really is just for emergencies. So we would have to spend a lot of time showing parents how the mobile learning can be useful. After all, our Ministry has introduced mobile learning with D2L for all of our online and blended learning…so we have no excuse. We know that we are going to have to remove the ban on cellphones, deal with the complaints teachers always had that kids were too interested in texting friends when they had them, and provide PD for teachers to help them use the phones to advantage.
I like the list of activities for the cellphones David – extensive and they are really meaningful uses – that should get more buy in from teachers and parents.
Brenda
For me, I prefer the bigger screen too – for learning at least because I have no problem watching movies on my teeny tiny iPod Classic on flights – talk about a tiny screen!
Posted in: Week 11: Mobiles
Keisha Edwards-Hamilton 5:38 am on November 18, 2011 Permalink | Log in to Reply
Many school managers and administrators today have come to the realization that cell phones have great potential for teaching and learning and thus have been making attempts to remove the ban on cell phones in schools. There should however be policies in place to regulate the use by students to ensure that it will be used for teaching and learning activities mainly.
David William Price 6:33 am on November 18, 2011 Permalink | Log in to Reply
Data plans certainly are an issue. One way to get around that is to focus on using apps that you download once, perhaps over WIFI.
With respect to distraction, based on my recent lit review of anxiety management, there are two ways of dealing with anxiety issues (distraction being a person’s tendency to avoid anxious feelings by doing other tasks). One is to remove distractions. The other is to scaffold learners into confronting their anxious feelings directly and managing them instead of turning to distraction.
A very simple way of teach distraction management is something called “implementation intentions”. These are plans learners develop beforehand. The plan is an “if-then” plan. “If this distraction happens, then I will do X.” Apparently they work well. Why? When people are anxious, they use up working memory. They don’t have extra resources to do deep thinking about how to handle problems. By working out the plans ahead of time, they don’t have to think about what to do with a distraction. They already have their plan ready. Apparently it works well for managing test anxiety and handling distractions. Worth checking out.
I think it’s worthwhile to scaffold anxiety management (distractions, avoidance, etc.) through graduate exposure. The literature shows performance increases… and it will help learners in the future. How many adults do you know who can’t stay on task?
bcourey 1:48 pm on November 18, 2011 Permalink | Log in to Reply
Interesting take on the reasons for allowing distractions to take place – I think in many of our cases in secondary schools, it is more a case of boredom…they would rather text with friends than tackle the tasks in the classroom – maybe boredom, maybe avoidance of a task they don’t understand. I accept that some may be anxiety….but in my case, if I am in a meeting and I am suddenly finding myself checking my emails on my BB instead of listening to the speaker, it is often because I am bored silly or disengaged from the topic at the moment.
Brenda
David William Price 1:53 pm on November 18, 2011 Permalink | Log in to Reply
Boredom is part of a spectrum of arousal. I tend to see boredom as an example of anxiety (I am too anxious to find the value in what I am hearing, and I feel I should be doing something else right away) whereas when I am in the right state of arousal, something that should be incredibly boring (such as staring at a sunset) feels very fulfilling.
That being said, even if you reject my own way of thinking, it’s not the device itself that is the problem, it’s (a) pedagogy that doesn’t engage; and (b) an inability of the learner to manage their impulse to do something else instead of look for or create meaning in the current activity.
For instance, one way I create meaning in activities that seem boring is to interrupt them and ask annoying questions. Or ask for examples. Or use some other technique to make the situation meaningful. Those are skills that can be taught… they could even be scaffolded through mobiles as performance supports to make meetings/talks meaningful!