Mobile Learning infokit / Overcoming barriers and finding enablers
  • If you are citizen of an European Union member nation, you may not use this service unless you are at least 16 years old.

  • You already know Dokkio is an AI-powered assistant to organize & manage your digital files & messages. Very soon, Dokkio will support Outlook as well as One Drive. Check it out today!

View
 

Overcoming barriers and finding enablers

This version was saved 12 years, 8 months ago View current version     Page history
Saved by Doug Belshaw
on July 8, 2011 at 2:38:41 pm
 

"There were two main drivers for mobile developments at the University. One was pedagogic and came from the Learning Technology team, who recognised the potential of mobile technology to provide opportunities for more flexible, situated and personalised learning. The other driver came from our Marketing team, who saw mobile development as a way to raise the profile of the institution, and make information more readily available to prospective students, parents and visitors." (Julie Usher, University of Northampton)

 

"Most major companies have R&D centres to explore the opportunities for innovation in their products. The product of UK higher education is excellent teaching and learning, nowadays enhanced by technology. It makes sense to have a joined-up approach to institutional innovation, perhaps through an innovations unit that can test the most promising research, commercial development, and open source initiatives - recommending promising approaches for deployment. With mobile technologies, this could mean working with small groups of ‘early adopter’ students and staff who could act as informants on new products and developments. " (Mike Sharples, Nottingham University)

 

"We also need senior management to recognise the potential and the importance of e-Learning and m-Learning and most importantly what that means in terms of “contact time” so that time spent, not only developing and administering online resources but also time spent communicating online is valuable and important." (Tony Bartley, Lowestoft College)

 

"Senior management will inevitably focus on the bottom line and so it is important to be able to demonstrate, as far as possible, how what we are doing with e-Learning benefits the College, in real terms. So if it can be linked clearly to improvements in retention, achievement and success, all the better." (Tony Bartley, Lowestoft College)

 

"The most positive thing – getting senior staff / managers on board. I think my approach to admin first paid off in that I put a corporate mobile push system in place, whilst it’s not perfect it’s better than what was there before and I think it helped getting senior staff on side and see the benefits of the technology. Having them on side definitely opens doors, and when you do hit a road block their support can be very helpful." (John Fairhall, University of Bradford)

 

"Mobile learning by it’s nature is anytime so depending on the implementation, there is a possibility of generating a barrage of communications. Existing descriptions of lecturer roles don’t always make it easy to recognize time spent in supporting students in contexts other than face-to-face contact. It is not going to always be possible to use automated processes, so this needs to be addressed- i.e what counts when using mobile learning as “contact time”." (Claudia Igbrude, Dublin Institute of technology)

 

"Practical difficulties: staff development and support, network adequacy and security, standards and quality, equity and access ..... all the usual technical/tactical stuff.

Cultural difficulties: anxiety and concerns (as in the 'concerns based adoption model'); (re)presenting 'mobile learning' as no longer the domain and prerogative of the vanguard of an innovative-driven e-learning research and development community but just learning with mobile devices whatever that might mean to specific communities of learners and teachers with their context and curriculum; teasing out what students in any specific context think and feel is the nature of the 'deal', the rules of engagement, the 'contract', between them and their corner of their educational institution, as we the educators consider intruding into their devices, their systems, their time, their networks, their spaces, their communities." (John Traxler, University of Wolverhampton)

 

 

Enablers

"Accessible wi-fi throughout all buildings, wi-fi which can be easily used by learners own devices." (Dave Pickersgill, Sheffield College)

 

"Full, and public, backing from Management." (Dave Pickersgill, Sheffield College)