I was excited to see Ciampa’s (2013) mobile technology and motivation article as a reading for this course as I’ve used it as a major source for a paper in ETEC 511, as well as an influential model for my research proposal in ETEC 500. This reading is a great indicator for seeing how mobile technologies can impact student motivation for learning and involvement in the classroom space, as well as an exploration of pedagogical growth and how reciprocal teaching can occur between students and adults in a learning community.
My school context is likely an anomaly when compared to other public schools who typically wrestle with the “technology cart” issue. My elementary school was the first in the district to purchase iPads, and of course, we initially had them in a cart and they were wheeled around to share across the school. Teachers also got iPads around the same time and were encouraged by administration to take them home and “play”. Apple ID and passwords were no secret; anyone could download anything within reason that they wanted to try, paid apps included. Some teachers got really into using them and they booked them out all the time. There was increased interest when administration offered to purchase even more devices. As a result, we ended up hosting the first two 1:1 iPad classrooms in the school district, one at the Grade 2 level and one at the Grade 5 level. Those teachers were not young, but experienced, with over 20 years and 30 years of service, respectively.
The remaining devices were filtered into classrooms across the school as even more were purchased by our parent group and administration. (Keep in mind this was a major focus of our school’s mission and vision over that time period – we weren’t made of money; we made sacrifices in other spots and we’re a small school of only 10 classes.) Each classroom “pod” (2-3 rooms around the same grade levels) had access to anywhere between 10-15 iPads. Some pods opted to split them up so they always had a smaller group in their room to access at anytime. Total autonomy was given to how this was done and it seemed to result in very successful and laid back collaborations around device bookings.
Over time, the types of activities that have been done with the iPads have shifted. I have witnessed (and helped along, as a coach) teachers who were predominantly using iPads with their students for highly directed and predictable work such as memory games or math drills. When these teachers began to blog and use social media with their students, there was a shift in the value of student-created work vs. students consuming content in order to better provide an accurate window into the learning community. As a result, students were encouraged to be more self-directed, ask and research their own questions on a topic, engage in online commentary, and connect with experts over media like Twitter (I.e. Olympians, authors, etc.). Kids started creating Genius Hour projects and screencasts talking about their thinking and learning out loud – great artifacts for teachers as both formative and summative assessment pieces. I saw students shift from being told which apps to use to getting to choose them on their own, developing their understandings of technical workflows and pathways (saving to the cloud, importing from camera roll, etc). And, of course, parents absolutely RAVE about the classrooms that use these tools because they get to see far more into their child’s day than ever before. There were and are many positives that we have seen through mobile technology integration in our community.
Of course, it’s not all roses and rainbows in a mobile-enriched school. Management is a major issue for our school with so many devices. Sometimes things don’t work and teachers need to set aside a device or move on to Plan B right in the middle of a lesson. For example, we’ve had issues with individual devices and ghost storage, where the device will appear with maxed storage, even though there is no reason for it to do so, resulting in students unable to save their work. The major downside to mobile technologies is that you need someone around who is able to troubleshoot these issues and provide solutions to students and teachers who work so hard to integrate them. What you don’t pay for in print materials, you might end up paying for in human resources. The support provided to Natasha in Ciampa’s (2013) study is no joke; so far as I’ve seen, it’s necessary for ongoing success of mobile integration.
With all that being said, we have seen a wonderful shift in our learning context that will hopefully continue in years to come. It’s not always perfect, but it’s always growing. This is all thanks to supportive leadership, teachers who are willing to work hard at professional development, students who are open to supporting teachers while they (both) learn, and a parent community who is very open to us taking a crack at technology integration and digital publication with their kids.
References
Ciampa, K. (2013). Learning in a mobile age: An investigation of student motivation.Journal of Computer Assisted Learning, 30(1), 82–96. Retrieved from http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/jcal.12036/epdf