Introduction to mLearningInge – Ignatia – de Waard

Interactions in Elluminate

What will we see today?• A bit of back-ground• Hands-on moment (posting to posterous)• 2 mobile learning projects• Your questions and remarks on ANY mLearning subject!

Starting is always a bit of chaos• Introductions, getting to know the format…• but it is good to be on the move!

So planning is of the essence

Question: who has started working on their mLearning project? (survey: 51% knows what they will work on)

• Basic template for starting a mLearning project can be found here – and Judy Brown will lift all of you to the next level in Week 2 where she will cover planning mLearning (amongst other mLearning goodies)

From the survey: interest in hands-on & exchanging experiences

• Hands-on: posterous: e-mail any content to a central location• 2 Experiences:

• mobile learning project in Peru• Continued Medical Education for smartphones and basic cell

phones

Hands-on moment: PosterousJust imagine: you have a group of learners spread around the world and you ask them – without having to become member of anything – to share mobile created content via simple e-mail?

It works! Instantaniously! Let’s see for ourselves

Please, for those having access to a mobile phone (or camera equiped net/laptop or tablet pc), take a picture of where you are at right now (be sure to put your pixels on small to save on data costs!) and mail it to:

mobimooc@posterous.com

After you have mailed it, take a look at the MobiMOOC posterous group blog to see our joint results: http://mobimooc.posterous.com/

For those testing it after the session: I have reset the permissions, so I need to accept your postings before they are posted, but feel free to try it.

mLearning is about .. (Informal) peer collaboration• mLearning (or eLearning) is not about having an online,

accessible repository.

• mLearning is: • collaboration, • networking, • accessing when most relevant • Learning at any time or in any place that fits YOU• Getting your context into the learning curve

• mLearning is an ideal for lifelong learning and continued education.

Mobile projects at ITMITM has been developing several mobile solutions both for

research and education (QRcodes, offline data gathering, mobile courses, mobile continued education...)

Our challenges: emerging countries, challenging environments & tiny budgets & tiny team (only 3 people that are really into mLearning testing and development)

Our strength: an interdisciplinary, creative eLearning team

Current start-ups: mobile gis project for monitoring ticks (geolocation, real time … fun!)and augmented medical learning app

Overall mLearning aims

• Durability• Scalability• Collaboration (local people know the local health

situation best)• Allowing user generated content (integrating

personal context)• Authentic learning• Low cost• Independent from - or at least flexible to -

infrastructure• Generic – ubiquitous whenever possible

Paradigm Break(It is no longer ‘just’ a phone)

Classical modelsms, voice New model

sms, voice, data, video, geoin REAL TIME

Internet

Graphs by Ellar Llacsahuanga

In 2008 the Institute of Tropical Medicine Alexander von Humboldt (IMTAvH) in Lima (= the real craftsmen of this project) and the Institute of Tropical Medicine (ITM) in Antwerp set up a mobile educational platform for healthcare worker (HCW) training:

downloading of the latest medical information knowledge sharing and data contribution

Case 1: the Peruvian mobile project

• Health care workers involved in HIV/AIDS care in Peru

• 20 Clinics in Department Capitals (urban and peripheral)

• More than 70% of the national patients receive treatment on those selected health facilities

• The selection was made working closely with the Ministry of Health

Target population and setting

How to apply in low resource settings (rural area) Wifi Local Area Network

100Km, a pair USD 1000

VoiP, intranet websites

• 20 physicians used individual Smartphones (Nokia N95 and iPhone), for a CME program, Oct ’09 – Jan ‘10

• Wifi, solar panels and wireless router (great for creating an ad hoc wireless hotspot! E.g. if you have one computer with internet, you can turn it into a hotspot for multiple devices with a wireless router). It saves on connection costs and increases autonomy

Methods

Pre-test (day 1)-access LCMS ( MLE Moodle)-via email -website

Clinical Case (day 3)-3D movies (podcast deliver using iTunes)-Questions related with clinical case(start discussion forum Moodle)-Critical thinking

wifi

Conclusion of discussion (day 10)- strengthening network

Send summary materialWebsite link (day 11)

Post-test (day 15)

SummaryDay 1: Pre-test with focus on a specific topic Day 3: Send Clinical cases with questions and start discussionDay 10: Conclusion of clinical casesDay 11:Summary of module (articles and review) Day 15: Post-test on the topic

CLINICAL MODULE

iClone & Moviestorm

doctor/patient scenarios

module revision was provided through multimedia files developed with ScreenFlow

Looking at examples, we used iTunes as a repository of the podcast during course: http://itunes.apple.com/be/podcast/central-videos-audios-reach/id332290043

Tools used

MLE Moodle• A web-based platform (MLE Moodle), is

offered to support the learning events, tracking students’ progresses over time

• Why Moodle? It is based on social constructivist idea (co-construction)

• After this we engaged in Mobile Moodle.

Pre post test• Baseline knowledge and learning

outcomes were tested through mobile-based multiple choice questions issued at the beginning and end of each module

1. Lack of mobile standards (html5 on the rise with W3C mobile web initiative)2. Lack of interoperability of the mobile programs3. Relatively high investment cost: mobile devices, phone service fee, mobile IT help desk for

technical problems4. Connectivity not assured and different per region5. Need more mobile theory research to really get the most out of the mobile possibilities6. Native apps => different approaches => time consuming (SDK’s)7. Augmented mobile learning is tough for limited budgets, but delivers more interactivity8. Real time feedback or content/context pick-up9. Time to find creative solutions

10. And the many challenges we heard here …

Challenges to tackle

(cartoon by Nick D Kim, nearingzero.net)

Actions taken (later reading)The actions we took were multiple, let me list 7:

1. We looked at the latest mobile phones supported by the national telecom companies, and we compared their functionalities. These functionalities had to enable reading comfort; they had to permit installing certain applications (for picture exchange, keeping connected with peers). The devices needed to have multimedia possibilities as we aimed to address different learner skills (text, audio, video). The devices also needed to have enough memory to enable big multimedia files to be stored on them. Synchronization with computers was necessary to allow cheaper downloading of new clinical modules. And last but not least, because we were aiming to add mobile social media, these media needed to be accessible by the mobile devices.

2. After purchasing the devices we started to compare mobile social media. Those media that could be accessed with both devices, and that offered a mobile design were chosen.

3. It was deemed necessary to use a mobile platform on which to store all the modules. So we started to look for mobile platforms that were both cheap and accessible. Mobile Moodle was chosen, as it offered the surplus of enabling ubiquitous learning in future projects, and because both institutes were using Moodle already as a learning platform.

4. At the same time content was being redeveloped: getting interactivity going, delivering both static (text) and multimedia content to cater to a variety of learner types, animations were made for patient/doctor conversation simulations.

5. To enable easy podcast downloads, we started using iTunes for education. 6. A facebook page was set-up to allow easy peer-to-peer information exchange. 7. Training was given to the participants (2 days, 1 day per type of mobile device)

Tools used (later reference)• Skype and facebook for p2p knowledge exchange• Moviestorm & iClone for animations• Screenflow and iMovie for multimedia files• RSS, podcast and iTunes (see examples) for retrieving material• Online mobile survey software: surveygizmo• MLE and iPhone.moodle.com.au

Not used here, but very useful• Great tool for offline mobile data gathering:

Survey-To-Go we use it in field research in non-connected areas (synchronizable with computers, works offline and waits until it can transfer data).

Acknowledgements

This work is a result of the collaboration between the eLearning teams of

ITM, Antwerp and the IMTAvH, Lima

B. Castillo Llaque, L. Fucay, C. Kiyan, D. Iglesias, V. Suarez, J. Echevarria Z., E. Llacsahuanga, M. Zolfo, L. Lynen, and I. de Waard.

This project was supported byREACH-Tibotec 2008, Educational Grant

Thank you!

Case 2: Creating mobile accessible CME (Continued Medical Education)

CME keeps physicians on top of their speciality & if it is linked to the Telemedicine website => growing number

of users

To tackle the CME we first looked at the mobile status of physicians

We needed to know:

- Which type of mobiles they had? (‘regular’ + smartphone)

- If they would be interested

- What would make a difference for them as a learner

What physicians wanted was/is

• Access with their own cell phone (so it needed to be accessible with cheap and expensive phones)

• Getting a message pushed to them when a new CME was launched

• Make it easily accessible (= no long connections needed)

• Certification for following it! Important career wise

Our delivery method of choice: standardized mobile content

So it was clear: HTML + CSS:

It is easy to build (dreamweaver or the free pagebreeze), is small in size, adapts to the phone screen and allows pictures/visuals (you need to resize them irfanview e.g.)

Mobile web initiative provides best practices

Getting the CME out there:

• Variable phone types + e-mail for feedback• One CME per month

See for yourself (this combines things that went wrong): http://tinyurl.com/ITM3CME

Adding user friendliness & motivation

Userfriendliness:

- Sending an sms when a new CME is issued (in our case using the Jeyo mobile companion);

- In the CME a tinyURL is embedded to allow quick access to the CME (smaller url = easier to type with cell phone).

Motivation:

- A certificate is issued if the learners successfully (cut off 80%) take an assessment after 6 months of CMEs

(Jeyo mobile companion)

FeedbackAdvantages• They liked the relevant information that was brought to them• Learning at their own convenience• Opened new ways of learning• They felt connected with peers

Disadvantages • Access was not ensured in the field and this could drain the battery• The screen was small for learning (in the older cell phone types)• Without electricity the battery can run out• Graphics/tables sometimes unclear on small screens

Possible solutions for tackling CME challenges

Mobile offline possibilities enabling multimedia courses (mini Sdcards).

Mobile = mp4 conversion so you have any video you want. Use cheap video converter software like AVS4you (39,95 EUR)

Connect the mobile to a television set and use it as a desktop for bigger screen (e.g. for those rural areas that have TV-sets but no computer connection => sharing the mobile content via TV)

Solar panels are already out there

for everyone to use.

Our device challenge of today

(Geo)location

Mobile augmented

reality

what we want

Learning from: objects

& humans

Human enhancement

Real timerecognition & reaction

Easy mobile tools to check outBlogs

• Posterous.com : enables posting via simple e-mail + you can set-up posts to social media• Wordpress has a fully mobile pack: http://wordpress.org/extend/plugins/wordpress-mobile-pack/ • Blogger has this option as well, but no grouping feature: http://www.blogger.com/mobile-start.g

Mobile layout: redesign your blog to be mobile accessible: http://www.mofuse.mobi/

Twitter: easy as sms and in many cases there is a specific twitter app for your phone: http://mobile.twitter.com/

Facebook has a mobile feature: http://m.facebook.com/home.php?_rdr

Skype:

Pictures• Flickr : has a mobile option which allows you to simply mail pictures to the account -

http://m.flickr.com/#/home • Picasa for mobile: https://picasaweb.google.com/m/

Video• YouTube: has a mobile option for sharing video (beware of the data transfer cost!):

http://www.youtube.com/mobile • Record and share video’s life (rerouted via twitter): Qik.com

For mobile developers• The mobile W3C corner (with a free website checker to see if

your site is mobile friendly)• MobiForge: a community of mobile developers• Html5 demo’s• Html5 standards

Just fun:• And just because they are fun – try them on your mobile• http://www.rovio.com/index.php?page=angry-birds

Resources• A free report on geo-located mobile learning• Free book on mLearning (edited by Mohamed Ally)• Free book on the risks of publishing content on the Web• Four free chapters on critical pedagogy (Paulo Freire)• Free book mLearning and new pedagogies• Online chapter: Bachmair, B. (2007) 'M-learning and media use

in everyday life'. http://www.wlecentre.ac.uk/cms/files/occasionalpapers/mobilelearning_pachler2007.pdf

• The 2011 Horizon report http://net.educause.edu/ir/library/pdf/HR2011.pdf

Contact

E-mail: idewaard@itg.be

Blog: ignatiawebs.blogspot.com (click the ‘mobile’ tag)

Twitter: http://twitter.com/Ignatia Slideshare (ppt): http://www.slideshare.net/ignatia

linkedIn: http://www.linkedin.com/in/ingedewaard