Seminar presentation at University of Peking, October 2011

1. Innovation in Mobile Learning:
An International Perspective
Mike Sharples
Institute of Educational
Technology
The Open University, UK

2. Open University UK
• Largest University in the UK
• 260,000 students
• Modern distance learning
• Open access
– Open to all people Milton Keynes
– Free access to learning materials online
– 20 million downloads from iTunesU

3. Mobile learning
“Any sort of learning that happens when
the learner is not at a fixed, predetermined
location, or learning that happens when the
learner takes advantage of the learning
opportunities offered by mobile
technologies”
Wikipedia. "Guidelines for learning/teaching/tutoring in a mobile environment". MOBIlearn. October 2003. pp. 6.

4. Mobile
Technology
• User centred
• Personal
• Networked
• Portable
• Ubiquitous
• Durable

5. Personalised
Learning
• Learner centred
• Individualised
• Collaborative
• Situated
• Ubiquitous
• Lifelong

6. Mobile Learning
• User centred • Learner centred
• Personal • Individualised
• Networked • Collaborative
• Portable • Situated
• Ubiquitous • Ubiquitous
• Durable • Lifelong

7. What is the difference between these mobile tablet devices?

8. Answer: 35 years!
Dynabook 1974 Alan Kay iPad 2010
“A personal dynamic
medium for children of
all ages”
Learning Research
Group, Xerox PARC

9. 1974
1997
2002
2002
2003
2004
2006
2008
2010

10. First phase of mobile learning
Handheld in classrooms
• Lecture response systems
– since 1947
• Handheld computers in
classrooms
– Since 1980s
• E-books
– since 1990
• Data logging
Focus on handheld technology for
formal education and training

11. Second phase
Learning across contexts
• Personal learning organisers
• Field trips
• Museum visits
• Bite sized learning
• Professional updating
• MOBIlearn and M-Learning
European projects
Focus on the mobile learner

12. Third phase
Ambient learning
• Augmented reality
learning
• Learning enhanced
physical spaces
Focus on a learning-enabled world

13. Innovations in mobile learning

14. From basic technology...
SMS text
game for You are in the
peer
drop-in centre.
There are
boxes of
condoms and
education
posters for fly-
posting. What
do you do?
in India

15. ... to advanced technology

17. Innovative international m-learning projects
MyArtSpace
Mobilearn exploratory
international learning with
context-aware mobile phones
mLearning in UK museums
platform
L-Mo adaptive
vocabulary
learning in
Japan

18. MOBIlearn (www.mobilearn.org)
2002-2004
• Funded by the European
Commission
• Aim: to develop services
for mobile learning outside
the classroom
• Scenarios
– Art gallery
– First aid in workplace
– Work-based MBA course

19. Large scale project
• 24 partner organizations
• €7.4 million funding ($10.8 million)
• Open web service-based system
• Content management
• Context awareness
• Collaboration
• Mobile multimedia
• Adaptive interface
OMAF systems architecture for MOBIlearn

20. Context
In a context Creating a context
“that which “that which
surrounds us” weaves
together”
Source: Cole, M. (1996). Cultural psychology: A once and future discipline.Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.

21. Context as a „shell‟ that surrounds the
human user of technology
Context created by the constructive
interaction between people and
technology
Source: Dourish, P. (2004) What we talk about when we talk about context. Personal and Ubiquitous Computing, 8 (1): 19-30.

22. Learning in context
Data
filtering and
integration
Data
filtering and
integration
Computer User
Context

23. Nottingham Castle museum

24. CAGE system
• Navigation in a conceptual
space through physical
movement
• Location-based content
delivery
• Ultrasound tracking system
• Context awareness:
– which painting?
– how long?
– been there before?

25. Creating context
Learning as
situated social
interaction and
knowledge
construction

26. MyArtSpace
• Aim: to connect learning in
museums and classrooms
• Enhance museums as sites for
authentic inquiry learning
• Learners as investigators
• Service on mobile phones and
website for inquiry-led museum
learning

27. Prepare inquiry in the
classroom MyArtSpace
Create and collect in the
museum
View and share in the
classroom
Present a personal
perspective

29. Evaluation
• Over 100 school visits
• by 3000 children in three museums
• Thousands of images and sounds created by
children in the museums and sent to personal
websites
• Year-long evaluation from initial design to
final deployment
• Observations, interviews, focus groups,
surveys

30. Summary of findings
• The technology worked
– Photos, information on exhibits, notes, automatic
sending to website
• Students spent longer (90 mins compared to 20
mins)
• Supported inquiry learning
• Encouraged children to make active choices
• Connected school and museum
• Need for more teacher preparation
• Managing the amount of collected material back
in the classroom

31. www.ooklnet.com

32. Djanogly City Academy “My favourite rich task is
„The Seasons‟ because you
get to study music, drama
First „mobile learning school‟ and dance every day for a
whole term and they are
• Flexibility and mobility in my favourite lessons”
Christopher Berry Year 9
the classroom and outside
• Rich task curriculum
– E.g. Exploring science and
ethics
• Breaking down the
separate zones of teacher
and pupil
• Open (filtered) access to
the Web

34. Smartphones for language learning
Sharp Labs Europe
University of Nottingham
Tokushima University, Japan

35. Incidental second language learning
E-book Selected
Personal Game Mobile
words words
vocabulary game
Read
story for Rehearse
vocabulary Practise
vocabulary
sentence
list
construction
Missing
words

39. Elmo Mark 2 for smartphones

40. Research question
Are there differences in the learning of
English vocabulary through reading
novels, depending on the mode of mobile
interaction?

41. Three modes of interaction
• Paper book
Paper book
• e-book reader with English
dictionary
• „ELMO‟: e-book reader with
enhanced software, including E-book
adaptive user modelling and
additional interactivity
Elmo
adaptive system

42. Participants
• 39 students (24 female, 15 male) aged 15-
17 at a Japanese high school
• 3 comparison groups balanced in terms
of English vocabulary and gender

43. Conclusions
• The study was carefully set up and rigorously
conducted
• It didn‟t show any particular technology to be
effective in enhancing incidental learning of
English vocabulary
• The technology wasn‟t engaging
• The books were too difficult and boring
• Since the work was not assessed there was
no external motivation
• Japanese teenagers have little or no free
time in the evenings

44. Elmo Mk3 for Android device
Product launch by Sharp in Autumn 2011

45. Toponimo– Tommy Sweeney
Context and social language learning
• See nearby locations
(from Google maps
API)
• Click on a location

46. • Read words linked to
the location, with
definitions
• Add new words

47. • Change the definition
and pronunciation
• Add photo of the
word in context

48. • Share words,
definitions, photos,
pronunciations
• Rate words for
relevancy

49. Personal Inquiry
• Three year project
• University of Nottingham/ Open University
• Aim:
– To help children to engage in effective science
inquiries

50. How can we help children to think,
talk and act like good scientists?

52. Myself My Environment My Community
Personally meaningful investigations
Food packaging Urban heat islands
and decay
Fitness and heartrate
Healthy eating Effect of noise
pollution on birds Micro-climates

53. Low cost inquiry toolkit

54. Lower cost inquiry toolkit
• Calculator
• Timer
• Camera
• Audio recorder
• Accelerometer
• Location tracker
• Tilt sensor
• Communicator
• Anemometer!

55. Inquiry Learning Cycle
Based on:
- Previous research
on representing the
inquiry process
- UK national
curriculum
language and
process for inquiry
learning
- Participatory design
with science
teachers

56. Record a daily food diary

57. For each meal – take a photo,
describe the meal. Software
computes nutritional content.

58. Compare to recommended daily intake

59. Powerful tools to create new inquiries

60. Median scores of domain knowledge
80
70
60
50
40 Pre-test
30 Post-test
20
10
0
Personal Inquiry Control

61. Enjoyment of science lessons
29
28 PI Control
27
26
25
24
23
22
Pre-test Post-test

62. nQuire online
www.nquire.org.uk

63. International collaboration in mobile
learning
University of Twente, University of Oslo, Joseph
Fourier University, University of Duisburg-
Essen, University of Bergen, Fraunhofer
IAIS, University of Cyprus, University of Tartu, De
Praktijk, Stichting Technasium, ENOVATE, Ontario
Institute for Studies in Education
Växjö University, Sweden, Stanford
University, Intel Research, Pasco,
National Geographic Society
Open University, University of
Nottingham, ScienceScope, UK research
programme in Technology Enhanced Learning