mlearning

When I think about the next generation of learners, I think of young adults who have been raised with smartphones. I teach middle schoolers in a pretty affluent district and most of the 6^th graders have nicer shoes and phones than I do!  The challenge for teachers today is to prepare students for jobs that don’t even exist yet. So even though smart phones are not usually permitted within the public school classroom, yet, we have to prepare them for classrooms and jobs where they must use them wisely. I think that mobile learning is only as rich as the content and the audience. Meaning, if you give the learners worthy topics to learn and discuss, mobile learning can be effective. If the mobile learning is only click through simulations and games, it  is not really embracing what smart phones are intended for…communication and connection. This week’s topic of mlearning is absolutely tied into social media. Today’s learners are n the go with everything, so the learning must be too. Discussion boards will be replaced with text messages or tweets. Educational posting pages, such as Edmodo allow the instructor share content that is accessible by mobile device and allows for a safe a supervised space for young students to communicate about the topic. I imagine Instagram could be mobile learning tool where students could take photos, post them online and thus create a virtual field trip to share with the class.  However, I believe that mobile learning and social media have the potential to “get away” from the instructor. Tools that provide the instructor the opportunity to be a facilitator and moderator can help keep learners on target with the objective.