Carsten cites a research paper (PDF download) “Computer Supported Ubiquitous Learning Environment for Vocabulary Learning Using RFID Tags” by Hiroaki Ogata, Ryo Akamatsu and Yoneo Yano, in which it is proposed that ‘ubiquitous learning’ is what is destined to follow mobile learning. Key characteristics of ubiquitous learning would include:

1. a) Permanency: Learners never lose their work unless it is purposefully deleted. In addition, all the learning processes are recorded continuously everyday.
2. b) Accessibility: Learners have access to their documents, data, or videos from anywhere. That information is provided based on their requests. Therefore, the learning is self-directed.
3. c) Immediacy: Wherever learners are, they can get any information immediately. Thus, learners can solve problems quickly. Otherwise, the learner can record the questions and look for the answer later.
4. d) Interactivity: Learners can interact with experts, teachers, or peers in the form of synchronous or asynchronous communication. Hence, the experts are more reachable and the knowledge becomes more available.
5. e) Situating of instructional activities: the learning could be embedded in our daily life. The problems encountered as well as the knowledge required are all presented in their natural and authentic forms. This helps learners notice the features of problem situations that make particular actions relevant.

This should help inspire some of our future product design.

Students should not have to adapt to learning, instead learning systems should adapt to students - that is, learning on your terms.

Changing Role of the Classroom

At every evolutionary stage the role of the classroom changes. The classroom performs certain value-creating functions, e.g. course & class organization, student motivation, lesson input, opportunities for feedback, etc. As ICT is introduced into this environment certain functions can be migrated out of the classroom (e.g. moving lesson input to pre-class podcasts) thereby allowing classrooms to better focus on their remaining functions. As classrooms and ICT are integrated a better learning experience is created.

1. Era of the Classroom

(from our corporate site) Traditional education is a product of the 19th century: mass-produced programs, delivered in a teacher-centric, ‘one-to-many’ format. In that model, learning was organized around the needs of teachers and institutions, while content and objectives were imposed upon the learner, rather than being chosen by him. The learner was forced to adapt to the needs of the system.

Study location:

• Classroom

Impetus for next evolution:

• Why can’t I take advantage of multimedia in my studies?

2. Introduction of Computer Labs

In the 1980’s computers with multimedia software were introduced to compliment the classroom learning experience.

Study location:

• Classroom + computer lab

Impetus for next evolution:

• Why can’t I study at home?

3. Introduction of the Web

Network connectivity enabled synchronous/asynchronous distant learning which led to the rise of various LMS’s. As the tools evolved, network connectivity sparked Web 2.0 and all its community-nurturing features. Centralized databases allowed for high-levels of personalization.

Study location:

• Classroom + web-connected computer

What slowed adoption?

• Transition from dial-up to broadband.

Impetus for next evolution:

• Why do I have to sit in front of a computer to learn?

4. Introduction of Mobile

Mobile removes the awkwardness of needing to sit in front of a computer to learn and adjusts the learning system to the learner’s specific needs and context – this is the full realization of learning on your terms. The goal of mobile should be to build upon the strengths of classroom and web study, but reduce the number of necessary classroom functions and remove the location-bound computer from the process.

Study location:

• Anywhere

What slows adoption?

• Usable web browsing on a mobile device & broadband mobile networks.

What happened to podcasts?
The iPod & podcasting were only a half-step to mobile because they had no network access which limited availability, community and personalization. The iPhone completes the full evolution to mobile.

With the mobile phone being such a personal device one wonders what will be the next stage in this evolution.

From their site:

What might a university look like with a fully deployed program of converged devices like the iPhone? Connected is one possible vision. This fictional day-in-the-life account highlights some of the potential benefits in a higher education setting when every student, faculty, and staff member is “connected.” Though the applications and functions portrayed in the film are purely speculative, they’re based on needs and ideas uncovered by our research - and we’ve already been making strides to transform this vision of mobile learning (mLearning) into reality.

It seems that perfection is reached not when there is nothing left to add, but when there is nothing left to take away.

… or in less zen-like terms: keep it simple, stupid (KISS).

The more I am using the iPhone app store, the more I am understanding how simplicity will be the key factor in driving adoption of mobile web applications by the mainstream. In 5 taps of my finger I can quickly get a full-fledged application on my device. After a quick download, I can immediately start using it. Then when that application is updated I am clearly notified (unlike Nokia Symbian app’s) that a new download is available. Simple to understand. Easy to use.

Users should not have to contort their behavior to use your service.  I see this as an area where our own Praxis Language mobile sites fall down a bit. ChinesePod Mobile is an extremely flexible and convenient way to learn Chinese on the go - if, one goes through the effort of setting up an account, configuring their RSS feed, downloading the lesson files, adopting a suggested study approach, and so on. While theoretically possible, this is far too convoluted of a process for an average student to go through. Technology is supposed to assist in learning, not construct additional barriers. Learning should adjust to students, not the other way around.

A 2005 Educause report “Enabling Mobile Learning” listed five lessons from the deployment of e-learning that they suggested by kept in mind for m-learning. The fifth point stuck out for me (bold highlights mine):

The better the experience and the more intentional the results, the greater is the likelihood that learning will occur. In reflecting on the importance of experience design in software development, Kevin Mullet has noted that early software users were themselves programmers and consequently were highly tolerant of complex interactive models and primitive visual displays. Today’s users are very different. Interactive software is now considered useful only to the extent that ordinary users can understand and take advantage of the functionality it provides. Looking at it from a learning-oriented perspective, when technology can help strengthen learner motivation, focus attention, make a learning moment more memorable, or demonstrate the relevancy of learning to performance, the greater is the likelihood that technology will have a direct positive effect on learning. To this end, one exciting possibility of the coming mobile movement is an opportunity for a sharper focus from instructional technology and instructional design programs on the value of experience design for learning.

An obsession for simplification in design will drive mobile learning into the mainstream.

It is worth using this analogy in understanding that educational resources online have not yet managed to move much toward the cloud phase. Most online education stuff is embedded in structures like curricula and courses, which are patterns and not miscellaneous. GoldenSwamp.com is dedicated to writing about the cloud of learning resources that surely will be crucial in the learning enlightenment that lies ahead. Patterns are not inherently bad, but nodes that are free to participate in more than one pattern offer a richer learning environment. Cloud learning would be such an environment.

I like the concept, but wonder why she choose a ’swamp’ as her metaphor. Seems rather dark and unappealing, especially compared to a Simpsons-like cloud. More on the topic from her recent presentation at Microlearning Conference 2008:

Judy Breck - Cloud Education (Microlearning Conference 2008) from Teemu Arina on Vimeo.

One comment that particularly resonated was near 27:00 where she recommended un-bundling courses into micro-content to improve their findability. Or, one could just design modular lessons in the first place as we do with our LanguagePod’s.

Further reading:

• Interwingle (free PDF book download)

True mobile learning is personalized learning that unites the learner’s context with cloud computing using a mobile device.

As we evaluate how to improve our personalized learning system we have been comparing our approach against the above definition and contrasting our approach with other methods to learn foreign languages.

To support this analysis we further fleshed out a few definitions. First, in order to be sensitive to the learner’s context one must take into account their current proficiency level, learning goals, personal interests, and other personal/environmental contextual variables. A learning service needs to be able to be personalized to accomplish this. Specifically, it must have the ability to (i) identify student learning goals, (ii) remix lessons into customized courses that can set students on the pathway to these goals, (iii) provide one-to-one practice opportunities and (iv) facilitate personally-tailored, reinforcement opportunities.  Second, ‘cloud computing using a mobile device’ not only represents the ability to access the Internet through an iPod, iPhone, PDA, laptop, etc, but also the social aspect, the community, that goes along with network connectivity.

Textbooks and CD-ROM’s are neither personalized, nor available on a networked device.

Offline classes can offer a degree of personalization, but are not available on a networked mobile device.

Software applications (e.g. iPhone 2.0 app’s), target language media (e.g. Youtube, Youku, etc.), and most language podcasts can be made available on networked mobile devices, but the learning is not personalized.

No existing language learning product currently fits the above description for mobile learning, that is, both personalized and accessible on a networked mobile device.

Customizable courses are the key to breaking down these barriers. Students, or their teachers, should be able to re-mix modular lessons into a course that is specifically designed to solve the student’s individual needs. SafariU is doing this with IT textbooks so why couldn’t the same model - for other subjects - be put online and made available for mobile devices?

The nature of podcasts makes them the ideal ‘plumbing’ to facilitate mobile learning.  Being modular by design, podcast lessons could be re-mixed and put into personalized courses. Furthermore, podcasts rely on RSS distribution, which is channel agnostic and can equally distribute learning media to any networked device. Many language podcast publishers have forsaken this opportunity by adopting backward-looking, textbook-emulating linear curriculums.

Imagine a scenario where a student gets a 20-minute needs analysis with a counselor over a phone. The counselor identifies the student’s needs and then re-mixes an appropriate course from an archive of lessons. A family wanting to adopt a Chinese child - no problem. An expat who wants to be able to better work in his Chinese office environment - no problem. The student then starts a daily routine of (i) listening to podcasts on the way to work, (ii) taking 10 minutes in the morning to go onto the website and review the lesson they heard earlier, (iii) practising their new language with a co-worker or a teacher via Skype for 15 minutes at lunch and then (iv) reviewing the vocab they previously saved to the personal accounts by using flashcards on their iPhone on the trip home.

This is the mobile learning vision - that is both personalized and available on a networked mobile device - that our Guided products are trying to achieve.

That said, I think it is important to not universally apply Hague’s thinking to all types of media as there are some assumptions in his thinking.

For example, he states in his recent User Generated Context paper:

Most user generated content, is, in fact, context. The bulk of what connected consumers create isn’t content: its context - information about the value of goods and services. Context in turn, lets connected consumers search and navigate the exploding universe of media more effectively, and massively amplifies incentives for quality.

I agree, but this assumes search costs and a degree of modularity in the media content. While an individual article/post makes sense in isolation and is often consumed as a unique entity, this does not happen with podcast lessons where students consume lessons in sequence - even if of their own selection.

As a result, the largest search cost for a student is finding an appropriate service provider and not an individual lesson. Correspondingly therefore, user generated context is more valuable in identifying learning services, rather than the lessons themselves. This can be seen by the dominant preference for third-party bloggers to link to our sites (e.g. http://ChinesePod.com) themselves, rather than individual lessons.

Harold Jarche commenting on Umair’s paper states:

Creating good content on a platform that lets users (teachers & learners) add context may be the the real killer application in education. Content developers and institutions have been so concerned with protecting their content that they don’t see where the real value lies. Letting others add more context will only increase the value of their content.

But who needs this context? I think there is a clear case for teachers who are trying to put together an appropriate course by remixing a variety of learning materials. But for the students themselves? The compelling need is much harder to identify.

The fact is that there is an associated cost to produce high-quality learning content. If there are no ‘amplified-attention incentives’ for individual lessons themselves, do attention-based business models (e.g. advertising) make sense? Just how does letting students add ‘context’ to lessons actually increase the value of the lessons themselves? Therefore, shouldn’t students just be charged for access to high-quality content (subscriptions), thereby justifying future investments in more diverse and better content?

The situation for teachers is much more clear. Teachers should have free access to allow them to add context to the lessons (through comments, rating, etc), with the benefit of helping other teachers discover appropriate lesson content for their students.

True mobile learning is personalized learning that unites the learner’s context with cloud computing using a mobile device.

This is very much in line with our thinking on Personalized Learning Systems here at Praxis Language and offers a framework on a simple acid test for true mobile learning services: 1) it must be personalized and 2) it must be context sensitive (location, age, learning preferences, interests, search history, gender, language and learner achievements) and 3) it is consumed on a network-enabled mobile device.

Over the weekend, I was browsing through the education app’s released in the iPhone app store. They seem to fall into 3 categories: dictionaries, phrasebooks, and flashcards/quizzes.

Dictionary App. - Ultralingua ($29.99)

Phrasebook - Lonely Planet (free)

Capitalizing on Olympics fever, but free.

Phrasebook - iLingo ($9.99)

Simple service, but broad selection of languages.

Phrasebook - Lingolook ($4.99)

Nice graphics, but no audio?

Correction: audio is there, but would an audio icon or some visual response when a phrase is selected be too much to ask for?

Phrasebook - Gorilla (free)

A carry-over from their previous browser-based effort.

Flashcards/Quizes - AccelaStudy ($14.99)

Actually trying to be a learning tool as opposed to a travel tool. Simple functionality, but at least starting to incorporate some of the iPhone input methods (e.g. switching flashcards, turning cards).

All of these are clearly first generation applications. Look for next generations to have the three characteristics that Brandon Hall Research emphasized: personalized, context-sensitive and connected to the network via a mobile device.

I finished two books over the weekend with polarized views on customer involvement in product design.

First, Groundswell (p.194):

We’re not suggesting that a company like Apple turn its development over to its customers - that would be a tragic waste of talent. No, the companies that win by embracing their customers incorporate those suggestions into their own development and process strengths. The customers don’t tell these companies what to do - they just make suggestions. The difference is, these companies are listening to and acting on many of those suggestions. That’s what accelerates innovation - starting a conversation with your customers and using your skills to understand and exploit their knowledge.

I agree with most of this, but frankly the first line seems somewhat like fence sitting. Especially when compared to Inside Steve’s Brain (p. 63):

A lot of companies like to say they’re customer-centric. They approach their users and ask them what they want. This so-called user-centric innovation is driven by feedback and focus groups. But Jobs shuns laborious studies of users locked in a conference room. He plays with the new technology himself, noting his own reactions to it, which is given as feedback to his engineers. If something is too hard to use, Jobs gives instructions for it to be simplified. Anything that is unnecessary or confusing is to be removed. If it works for him, it’ll work for Apple’s customers.

From our experience at Praxis, users have definitely been a powerful force in improving our LanguagePod platform, but bigger, step changes - for good and bad - tend to be more the result of a vision for how we see the service evolving.

Listen:

 http://www.brown.edu/Departments/Watson_…

In a similar spirit as Marshall McLuhan, the conversation uncovers Tony Schwartz’s opinions on the power of radio - many of which can be equally applied to the application of audio podcasts. There are a lot of tips here for the creation of podcast lessons, as well as the differences in using video.

Notes on the difference between radio and TV:

• People are born without ‘earlids’…what determines what people hear?…they hear what interests them, what concerns them….If we ‘pre-search’ peoples’ concerns and media channels - we will know that our message will be heard.
• There is a fundamental difference between seeing and hearing; with sight anyone can blink and look away, but with hearing and no earlids - listening depends on interest.
• Televisions is not a medium of information, it is a medium of effects - emotional effects, personal effects.
• The ear carries the heaviest freight, the eye is a distraction (almost need to neutralize image to get message across). The eye distracts, the ear is what we are really about.
• (levels of engagement) Compare your frequency of changing TV channels as compared to radio stations?

Notes on the ‘responsive chord’:

• Communication is not what I say, it is what you hear. It is not the words I use, it is how you interpret those words. For me to communicate with you I need to know how you feel.
• Don’t tell me what you think, talk to me about what concerns me.
• Sometimes you speak to people who don’t agree with you…start first with their position and gradually move them to your position.
• When speaking to people that already agree with you, just tap stored memory and remind.
• When you make yourself human (e.g. self-depreciation), you increase your credibility with the audience you are trying to reach.

And a gem of a quote by Lydon:

The human voice - that integrates so much chaos into a palpable human stream - is the answer to information overload.

These lessons are just as applicable to the creation of learning media as they are for mass media.