This week I "launched" a new website for my action research project, goingmobile2.weebly.com and it's got me thinking of the old school Who song, Going Mobile. Every time that I watch the T-Mobile commercial with the thin gal on the pink motorcycle, I am reminded that our cell phones are pretty much as common place as the toaster in my kitchen. If it wasn't for all the money that we spend on these fancy and powerful communication devices (except for Jason's :), they would just fade into the scenery of our lives. In his book, Here Comes Everybody, author Clay Shirkey commented that communication devices would not get socially interesting until they are technologically boring and common place. I think we are very close to being there. One of the questions that still seems to puzzle us is, how can we leverage the mobility of these devices to benefit education? In my literature review for my action research project, an article by Kurt Squire spoke of these mobile media tools as causing us to redefine our understanding of place. This subtle shift in how we perceive and interact with the world around us is profoundly changing how we gather information and publish our own world view, but how can these devices help education?
When I began this action research project in August, I felt that our familiarity with mobile media technologies in our daily lives, might allow education to capitalize, in an academic sense, on the ubiquity of these tools. It is exciting to see that in this cycle of action, the participants felt that these tools had a positive impact on their learning and collaboration outside of the classroom. While Twitter and Glassboard were originally designed for mainly social communications, the data in this cycle points to the potential for the use of the tools for knowledge building in education. I feel that my experience with these students and professors have helped form a new scheme of my own understanding of the need for education to look at how and where we learn best. I had originally thought that technology was best when used by students in a classroom to bring the world of knowledge and information into the formal environment of the class. I now think that it may be in part quite the opposite. If mobile media technologies can be used, rather, to bring the classroom and the learner into the world that they live in, we may find that students experience a greater understanding of the context of their learning. In this cycle, all three groups of students engaged in knowledge building in the moments between their organized activities and responsibilities. The mobility of these tools allowed for the academic collaboration to be situated in the middle of their lives instead of separated from their lives by the physical walls of a classroom. While this is only one view of the potential use of these tools, I believe that it hints at what may be possible as we further explore the impact of mobile media technologies in the learning spaces of our lives.
Smartphones, tablets, iPods and the apps that allow us to carry the power of a personal computer in out pocket, while not transforming agents in and of themselves, have become as commonplace as a wrist watch in our daily lives. It is the personal nature of these devices that makes them a useful tool in our daily lives, but so far is mostly a disruption in our academic lives in the classroom. Because these devices are personal, the "threat" of distraction is too great for most classes and teachers. I feel the tension of this moment in our society where the very tools we use to gather and build knowledge before and after school, are the very ones that we are asked to "power down" so the learning environment is not distracted. To be fair, as I have stated above, mobile media technology is not always going to be a great fit for a structured, formal learning environment. The action and the experience of the participants in this cycle point to another way to leverage these powerful tools for learning and communication. I feel that the more we look at how to "expand the walls" of the learning environment to include more of our daily lives, the more we will be able to help students understand the context to construct knowledge. Mobile media technologies have the potential to enable our learning beyond the classroom, blurring the lines between the formal and informal learning spaces. My mind is filled with the possibilities that this research cycle point to, but will take the time to talk with the professors and students before beginning cycle 4 of this project. So far, this has been a journey of much greater self discovery than I had ever imagined. Changing my way of looking at how I prepare to take action and how I reflect on what I have learned have been the surprise outcomes of this action research project for me.
When I began this action research project in August, I felt that our familiarity with mobile media technologies in our daily lives, might allow education to capitalize, in an academic sense, on the ubiquity of these tools. It is exciting to see that in this cycle of action, the participants felt that these tools had a positive impact on their learning and collaboration outside of the classroom. While Twitter and Glassboard were originally designed for mainly social communications, the data in this cycle points to the potential for the use of the tools for knowledge building in education. I feel that my experience with these students and professors have helped form a new scheme of my own understanding of the need for education to look at how and where we learn best. I had originally thought that technology was best when used by students in a classroom to bring the world of knowledge and information into the formal environment of the class. I now think that it may be in part quite the opposite. If mobile media technologies can be used, rather, to bring the classroom and the learner into the world that they live in, we may find that students experience a greater understanding of the context of their learning. In this cycle, all three groups of students engaged in knowledge building in the moments between their organized activities and responsibilities. The mobility of these tools allowed for the academic collaboration to be situated in the middle of their lives instead of separated from their lives by the physical walls of a classroom. While this is only one view of the potential use of these tools, I believe that it hints at what may be possible as we further explore the impact of mobile media technologies in the learning spaces of our lives.
Smartphones, tablets, iPods and the apps that allow us to carry the power of a personal computer in out pocket, while not transforming agents in and of themselves, have become as commonplace as a wrist watch in our daily lives. It is the personal nature of these devices that makes them a useful tool in our daily lives, but so far is mostly a disruption in our academic lives in the classroom. Because these devices are personal, the "threat" of distraction is too great for most classes and teachers. I feel the tension of this moment in our society where the very tools we use to gather and build knowledge before and after school, are the very ones that we are asked to "power down" so the learning environment is not distracted. To be fair, as I have stated above, mobile media technology is not always going to be a great fit for a structured, formal learning environment. The action and the experience of the participants in this cycle point to another way to leverage these powerful tools for learning and communication. I feel that the more we look at how to "expand the walls" of the learning environment to include more of our daily lives, the more we will be able to help students understand the context to construct knowledge. Mobile media technologies have the potential to enable our learning beyond the classroom, blurring the lines between the formal and informal learning spaces. My mind is filled with the possibilities that this research cycle point to, but will take the time to talk with the professors and students before beginning cycle 4 of this project. So far, this has been a journey of much greater self discovery than I had ever imagined. Changing my way of looking at how I prepare to take action and how I reflect on what I have learned have been the surprise outcomes of this action research project for me.