Developments in mobile learning could have a significant impact on learning and teaching practices. Mobile learning is decided upon by pilots and trials where technologies are being tested in many different learning contexts. These trials are showing that mobile learning has considerable teaching potential and also that many of the technical limitations are being overcome. Mobile learning is now gradually moving from small-scale, short-term trials to larger, more sustained and blended deployment, but within institutional constraints such as budgetary and human resources, institutional practices, procedures and priorities. (Kukulska-Hulme & Traxler, 2005). Mobile and wireless technologies support designs for learning are personalised, situated and authentic. It is more difficult to design intentionally for learning that will be spontaneous and informal, however mobile and wireless technologies do have affordances that support these types of learning. (Kukulska-Hulme & Traxler, 2005).
Personalised learning :- At Bletchley Park in England, researchers, (Mulholland et al. 2005), decided to use mobile technology to encourage follow-up activities to visitors to Bletchley Park museum. As the visitors look around the museum, they can express any of their interests in particular exhibits by sending text messages containing suggested keywords, using their mobile phones. This information is then used to create a personalised web site for each visitor to use when they get home, they can explore information about their chosen exhibits as well as semantic connections between them.
Authentic and Situated learning :- In a higher education context in the Netherlands, the Manolo project (2006) has amassed a great deal of experience in mobile fieldwork in subjects such as archaeology, biodiversity and vegetation science. Archaeology students used PDAs with GPS for field surveys. This allowed the students not only to collect field data in electronic form but also allowed them to be more involved in the processing and interpreting of the data, something which was not previously possible. The PDAs mobile phone function allowed the students to communicate with their group leader in the field and the texting and email functions for other types of support.
A project which took place at Deptford, (Sutch, 2005), called Mudlarking in Deptford, was aimed at schoolchildren using PDAs to take part in, and to co-produce, a guided tour of the riverbed at Deptford Creek. These handheld devices with GPS capabilities delivered location sensitive information when a child walked into node areas shown on a map. The children were also able to create multimedia content during their tour and alert others to that content. This project aimed o engage young learners in responding creatively to an environment that exacts physical experience with the history of the area.
Another example of the value of mobile technology in teaching and learning comes from the Savannah project, (Facer et al. 2005), a mobile game was devised for use by groups of children moving around in the school playing fields, the aim was to develop the children's conceptual understanding of animal behaviour in the wild. The 'learning experience' involved the use of GPSs linked.to PDAs through which the children 'see', 'hear' and 'smell' the world of the Savannah as they moved around the playing fields, pretending to be a pride of lions. There was also a designated area indoors where they could reflect on how well they did in the game, develop their strategies and access resources to support their understanding. (Kukulska-Hulme & Traxler, 2005)
After reading these studies I think my views on technology in the learning/teaching place may have changed slightly, I say slightly because I am still afraid of the unknown! Basically, how much fun learning must have been during these studies, for both student and teacher.
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