Professional Documents
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M Bile: Enabling
M Bile: Enabling
M Bile: Enabling
ENABLING
M BILE
LEARNING
By Ellen D. Wagner
40 EDUCAUSE r e v i e w 䡺 May/June 2005 Photo Illustration by Randy Lyhus, © 2005 © 2005 Ellen D. Wagner May/June 2005䡺 EDUCAUSE r e v i e w 41
The mobile revolution is finally here. victims during recent recov- p ro c e s s a n d m u lt ita s k
Wherever one looks, the evidence of mo- ery efforts in Sri Lanka. Who among using multiple media—
bile penetration and adoption is ir-
refutable: cell phones, PDAs (personal
RFID tags are being at-
tached to pets—and increas-
us isn’t learn how to think critically
and communicate effec-
digital assistants), MP3 players, portable ingly, even to children—for intrigued at tively while using today’s
game devices, handhelds, tablets, and
laptops abound. No demographic is im-
protection against abduc-
tion. An Economist magazine
the prospect and tomorrow ’s digital
tools?
mune from this phenomenon. From tod- excerpt reprinted in the of carrying
dlers to seniors, people are increasingly
connected and are digitally communicat-
March 15, 2005, issue of the
San Francisco Chronicle de-
our Why Not Mobile
for Learning?
ing with each other in ways that would scribed a number of ways in collections As mobile connectedness
have been impossible to imagine only a
few years ago.
which communities of faith
are using mobile technolo-
of music, continues to sweep across
the landscape, the value of
gies.1 For example, Cath- photos, deploying mobile tech-
The Current Mobile Landscape
Even though mobile networks and ser-
olics can now sign up for
daily inspirational text mes-
images, nologies in the service of
l e a r n i n g a n d te a ch i n g
vices in the United States are just at the sages from the pope simply books, and seems to b e b oth self-
beginning of broadband and broad-scale
adoption, mobile technologies clearly
by texting “Pope On” to a
special number (for exam-
documents evident and unavoidable.
And why shouldn’t mobile
have already changed life as we’ve always ple, in Ireland, the number literally in our learning accept its place in
known it. Using a Global Positioning Sys-
tem (GPS) means never getting lost again.
is 53141). Muslims around
the world can use the F7100
pocket the spotlight as the “educa-
tional revolution du jour”?
Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) handset—launched in July or purse? Using portable devices to
transponders have revolutionized inven- 2004 by LG Electronics of support teaching and
tory and supply chain management—not South Korea—both to re- learning is not a new con-
to mention the simple measure of con- mind themselves of prayer cept in educational circles.
venience they provide to weary com- times (the phone has an Robby Robson notes that
muters for on-the-fly payments of bridge alarm system that works in graphic calculators were a
and highway tolls. Bluetooth technology five hundred cities) and to revolutionary addition
makes it possible to create personal area find the direction of Mecca when they were first intro-
networks (PANs) among physically proxi- using the built-in compass duced to the classroom a
mate devices, connecting headset device in the handset. few decades ago but are
to phones, which can in turn connect to a Still, the anticipated ar- now often a requirement
computer, a PDA, and any other nearby rival of WiMAX (wireless for statistics and business
Bluetooth-enabled device. Instant mes- broadband) raises ques- classes.2 The use of PDA-
saging (IM) enables real-time and often tions regarding the liabilities based performance tools to
simultaneous connections among co- of being “always on, always support classroom instruc-
workers, friends, and family wherever connected.” Being tethered tion and on-the-job train-
there is access to a wireless communica- by the electronic leash of an ing alike has been well
tion network. Automotive manufacturers “always on” smartphone, under way for a number of
are talking about turning the car into the where one is expected to be years, particularly in the
next wireless services transceiver. Apple “always available,” can ex- fields of medicine and al-
iPods have managed to make pocket- tend the workday in fairly lied health, business, and
sized mass storage devices very hip and disconcerting ways. Ex- journalism. Currently, lap-
unmistakably trendy. Who among us isn’t tending the reach of “any- top computers used in
intrigued at the prospect of carrying our time, anywhere” access to higher education settings
collections of music, photos, images, learning resources raises outnumber desktop and
books, and documents literally in our inevitable questions about laboratory computers on
pocket or purse? And it doesn’t hurt that whether or not wireless ac- campus, while notebook
those immediately recognizable white cess in the classroom will computers are ranked as
ear-buds provide tangible evidence that encourage or enable cheat- the most important hard-
the wearer is numbered among today’s ing. Will brevity of ex- wa re i s s u e o n c a m p u s
digital cognoscenti. pression—characteristic of today, followed in second
Of course, persistent connectedness wireless communication— place by—you guessed it—
offers other value as well. GSM cell-phone trump depth of knowledge? cellular telephones.3
signals—or the lack of signals—were used Will the “filter genera- Bryan Alexander’s de-
to track tsunami survivors and to identify tion”—learners who multi- scriptions of “m-learning”
T
working standard, followed by Global Positioning System
with many acronyms and new expressions. 802.11a and 802.11g. (GPS): a satellite navigation sys-
The following descriptions are provided so Bluetooth: an industrial speci- tem used for determining one’s
that nontechnical stakeholders of mobile fication for wireless personal precise location and providing a
learning can better understand the technical area networks (see PAN) using highly accurate time reference
and industry-specific terms that are likely to be radio frequencies to link almost anywhere on earth. GPS
encountered. Please refer to the following Web links enabled devices. is controlled by the U.S.
for more complete descriptions of the terms noted Code Division Multiple Access Department of Defense and
below: <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/>; (CDMA): a rival to the TDMA stan- can be used by anyone, free of
dard in the Americas, this stan- charge.
<http://kropla.com/mobilephones.htm>;
dard was developed by Global System for Mobile-tele-
<http://www.w2forum.com>.
QualComm, from which phones (GSM): the most com-
2G: second-generation successor to 3G. It will feature providers must license its use. monly used cell phone standard
mobile telephone technology. high-speed mobile wireless CDMA carriers in the United in the world. GSM systems are
2G cannot normally transfer access with a very high data States include Sprint PCS used in nearly two hundred
data, such as e-mail or soft- transmission speed, of the (which started as a GSM carrier), countries, with six hundred mil-
ware, other than the digital same order of magnitude as a Alltel, and Verizon. lion subscribers worldwide.
voice call itself and other basic local area network connection Enhanced Data rates for Global GSM originated in Europe and
data such as time and date, (10 Mbits/s and up). It also Evolution (EDGE): a digital mobile can now be found in Africa,
although SMS messaging is addresses the notion of perva- phone technology that acts as a Asia, Australia, and North
available for data transmission sive networks, an entirely hypo- bolt-on enhancement to 2G and America. Originally utilizing the
for some standards. 2G ser- thetical concept in which the GPRS networks. This technology 900 Mhz spectrum, GSM
vices are frequently referred to user can be simultaneously operates in both TDMA and GSM providers in parts of Europe,
as Personal Communications connected to several wireless networks. EDGE is a superset Africa, and Asia later added
Service (PCS) in the United access technologies and can to GPRS and can function on additional capacity at 1800 Mhz.
States. 2G technologies are seamlessly move between any network with GPRS In North America, GSM service
either TDMA-based or CDMA- them. deployed on it (provided the is currently available only at
based standards, depending on 802.11: the official designa- carrier implements the neces- 1900 Mhz. Most cell phone
the type of multiplexing used tion for the wireless protocol sary upgrades). manufacturers offer dual-band
for signal exchange. known as Wi-Fi. Short for “wire- General Packet Radio Service (900 and 1900 Mhz) or tri-band
2.5G: See General Packet less fidelity,” Wi-Fi denotes a (GPRS): a mobile data service (900, 1800, and 1900 Mhz)
Radio Service (GPRS). set of wireless LAN standards available to users of GSM phones that will work in most
3G: third-generation mobile developed by working group 11 mobile phones. It is often places GSM systems are found.
telephone technology. The ser- of the IEEE LAN/MAN described as “2.5G”—that is, a Instant messaging (IM): a client
vices associated with 3G pro- Standards Committee (IEEE technology between the sec- that hooks up a user to an
vide the ability to transfer both 802). The term is also used to ond generation (2G) and third instant messaging service.
voice data (such as making a refer to the original 802.11, generation (3G) of mobile tele- Instant messaging differs from
telephone call) and non-voice which is now sometimes called phony. It provides moderate- e-mail in that conversations
data (such as downloading “802.11legacy.” The 802.11 speed data transfer, high-speed happen in real time. Most ser-
information, exchanging e-mail, family currently includes six “always on” data connections vices offer a “presence aware-
and instant messaging). over-the-air standards that all that are much faster than the ness” feature, indicating
4G: fourth-generation mobile use the same wireless internet traditional 9600 bps, by using whether people on one’s list of
telephone technology. When protocol. 802.11b was the first unused TDMA channels in the contacts are currently online
implemented, 4G will be the widely accepted wireless net- GSM network. and available to chat. Generally,
content-distribution capabilities to give outdated or inaccurate sections of a major notion of flexible learning content is
learners alternatives for pursuing their work. We also saw great possibilities for highly tenable and peer-reviewable (e.g.,
academic ambitions via online courses customization and personalization of MERLOT, <http://www.merlot.org>). Our
and programs. Learning objects helped us learning experiences by being able to ac- experiences with learning objects and
consider ways that we could disaggregate cess “just the right content, on just the with learning and content management
the course to use content elements as right device, for just the right person, at systems have helped us to anticipate the
components. We accepted the premise just the right time.”7 By separating content needs for interoperability and learning
that modularity makes it easier to update from course, we demonstrated that the technology standards, digital rights man-
agement, and content repositories. Learn- evidence, and effective practice guide- ical fallacy of self-evident truth, and the
ing and content management systems also lines derived by researchers and practi- self-evident truth of the value pro-
underscored the critical role of support tioners alike from each of these preceding position for mobile learning is no excep-
for faculty, students, and staff alike. Mo- revolutions in education. tion to this long-established caveat.
bile learning will be built on the founda- As we plan to embark on new mobile
tions of these previous educational tech- Lessons E-Learned initiatives, it pays to reflect on some
nology frameworks and thus can take full Every introductory research-design of the lessons learned from the early
advantage of the experiences, empirical course warns us to guard against the log- days of e-learning implementation,
cans play wireless games. layer that changes that mobile tech-
Education,” EDUCAUSE Review, vol. 39, no. 5
(September/October 2004): 28–35, <http://www.
He added that worldwide,
there are 170 million wire-
runs nologies are likely to in-
troduce in teaching, learn-
educause.edu/pub/er/erm04/erm0451. asp>.
5. Ellen D. Wagner and Robby Robson, “Education