some pictures of mobile learning

IMPORTANCE OF MOBILE LEARNING

Using phones in our schools can help the students to do a lot of research on their own. It will afford them the opportunity to study at their own pace. They can also learn how to respect time. This is because quizzes, assignments and tests will have time limit or deadline for submission or participation which students are obliged to adhere to.

Students can also access their lecture notes online and read them before coming to the classroom. With this, students will not be listeners but active participants because they have read the notes and some questions down for clarification.

In addition, using mobile phones and tablets will force teachers to do more research on topics before coming to the classroom. Some students will also read around the topic and gather enough knowledge about the topics before coming to class. Therefore, it will not be just lecturing but it will make the class very interactive.

Furthermore, mobile learning increases access for those who are immobile or cannot physically attend learning institutions – those who would not otherwise be able to follow courses in a traditional educational setting due to the constraints of work, household activities, or other competing demands on their time

Mobile learning makes education more accessible in that it enables learners to pursue their studies according to their own schedule. The portability of mobile technology means that mobile learning is not bound by fixed class times;

Moreover, mobile Learning enables learning at all times and in all places, during breaks, before or after shifts, at home, or on the go. Interestingly, however, while  mobile learning is portable, it is not necessarily associated with physical movement.

For those in rural or remote areas where environmental and infrastructure challenges hinder other learning modalities, particularly e-learning, mobile learning presents great opportunities.

Also, the individual learner, mobile technology is much less costing than other technologies like personal computers and broadband connections that are necessary for e-learning. The ubiquity of mobile phones, moreover, means that educational services can be delivered with learners’ existing resources. In as much as mobile technology presents a less cost- medium for learning, it represents an important avenue by which to reduce the gap between the rich and poor in contemporary society where access to knowledge and information is increasingly important.

Cellphones and smartphones can offer parents a little more peace of mind when their children are at school. Parents know that in an emergency the student can contact them, or vice versa. In addition, more and more cellphones and smartphones contain GPS devices that can be tracked if necessary

With all these advantages of mobile learning, I entreat Ghana Education Service to lift the ban on the use of mobile phones in our schools. The main piece of advice is to not consider just the tablet but also the potential for learning that comes with it. For instance, getting the right software applications and applications that will run on the devices. Firstly, the school has to have a strategy for securing the devices before they consider which pieces of software are going to benefit individual learners. It’s all about maximizing the child’s capacity for learning. The questions to ask are: where can they then use it? In the classroom? The school? Home? The aspect of connecting learning from school to home is the most important. It allows children to continue learning on a device they have a constant connection to and can then bring back to school for assessment in the classroom.

There are quite a large number of programmes being rolled out in schools in regards to tablet adoption. Some revolve around certain individuals having tablets, some around a class and some around a whole year. What’s your view on the premise of different programmes for different schools and what should we be aware of?

There are a number of different programmes because each school is different and has different needs. There was an issue when the early programmes started, where a whole year group got access to tablets at the same time and then two years later the tablets were out of date, again all at the same time, and the school would often have issues relating to the repurchasing appropriate technology.

What types of software are currently available and what should teachers, parents and students be aware of in regards to software?

It’s an important opportunity to introduce appropriate software that matches the curriculum and the needs of each individual child. There are thousands of apps online, some free and some paid, so it’s a challenge to decide what to buy or adopt that will meet the needs of each child. That’s why the EAS is so valuable, in providing advice on how you can correctly match software to the diverse needs of children.