Some years back while I was in a bus, my eyes went straight on a student who was using a mobile phone. The rapidity with which that girl was typing a message was incredible (and she was at the same time talking to her friend sitting near her!)... Waoh..
Mobile phones are banned in Mauritian schools. Various reasons are there:
1. Cyberbullying
2. Expensive equipment that can be lost
3. Cheating in exams
4. Disrupt classes
5. Fear
However, there is no running-away from the fact that today's generation of children are digital native and the majority has their mobile phones. Educational researcher Alan November called American schools, “reality free zones” in the June 2007 issue of Technology and Learning magazine. “If we could get past our fear of the unknown and embrace the very tools we are blocking (which are also essential tools for the global economy),” he said, “then we could build much more motivating and rigorous learning environments. We also have an opportunity to teach the ethics and the social responsibility that accompany the use of such powerful tools.” He went on to discuss how today’s students have “information and communication containers” different than those of past generations – mobile phones, iPods, blogs, computers, instant messaging, video games. These technologies are certainly different than the 16th through 19th Century technologies comfortable for those who run the schools (pens, paper, printed books, notebooks, chalkboards), but they are no less valid, just as those old technologies are no less fraught with potential problems.
How can mobile phones be used constructively in classrooms?
1. As calculator
2. Notepads for taking note
3. Stopwatch in P.E and in Science
4. Camera and video functions, e.g in Science where students can record experiments
5. Microphone function in language classes
What is happening world-wide?
Researchers and teachers in Ireland, Scotland, England, France, Israel, Portugal, Germany, Spain, Singapore, South Africa, Japan, Australia, Korea, New Zealand, Kenya and dozens of other nations are developing and supporting “mobile learning” initiatives. In the United Kingdom the government just supported the publication of a remarkable book from the Institute of Education at the University of London, Mobile Learning – towards a research agenda, which looks at the many cognitive interactive effects of this new educational context.
My Question
Are you as educator, personally prepared to use mobile phones in your classrooms?
Hemnath
Reference
Socol,I (2007), Don’t Hang Up on Your Students’ Futures, http://speedchange.blogspot.com/2007/12/dont-hang-up-on-your-students-futures.html
3 comments:
Hi Hem
I went to a conference where one of the speakers talked about a student who hooked up to the school's wireless using a PSP. Very cool. Unfortunately we don't have a wireless system but we do use web software, some of which can be used on a mobile device.
Also mobiles are great for journalling experiences to add to online docs like a blog.
Great post Hem
Stuart
Hi Stuart
Inddeed mobile phones are great tools. In the past i used to carry my notes, nowadays i have them on my mobile. Accessible everywhere.
Hem
It's true that mobile phones can play an important role in education and in schools in general but we are far from using that in Mauritian schools. Anyway this post was a great insight on the subject. ;)
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