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Saturday, October 8, 2016

IAmLearn Newsletter - 2016 - 3


In This Edition


IAmLearn Executive Notes
  • President's Message: Welcome to mLearn 2016

What's Happening: News and Notes
  • Teaching & Learning with Mobile Technologies Vodcasts
  • John Traxler: The Future of Mobile Learning
  • NATO Future Online Learning
  • Notes from International Mobile Learning Festival 2016
  • Nurturing Communities of Inquiry with DojoIBL
  • GEOSchool Day 2016
  • WEKIT: A New European Community on Augmented Reality and Wearables-Enhanced Learning
  • Overcoming Challenges in Mobile Learning Across Sectors 

Upcoming Events

Contributing to the Newsletter



IAmLearn Executive Notes

President's Message: Welcome to mLearn 2016

Hi IAmLearn-ers, Welcome to mLearn 2016!

It is again this special time of the year when many of us get together to celebrate our shared interests and be grateful for the IAmLearn community to which we belong and which we form together.  It makes me feel all warm, proud and “all kinds of wonderful inside” to be able to celebrate our passion for and service to the field of mobile learning through our annual conference dedicated to mobile and contextual learning – mLearn 2016. This 15th World Conference on Mobile and Contextual Learning is held October 24-26 at the University of Technology Sydney (UTS), a dynamic and innovative university located in the centre of Sydney, Australia.

The annual mLearn conference is the leading international conference on mobile and contextual learning that has attracted participants from more than 60 countries, including researchers, policy makers, professionals and educators from higher education, school education and vocational education, government departments, industries and international organizations as well as IT developers and solutions providers.  mLearn provides a forum for participants to share knowledge, research and practices as well as to debate critical issues pertaining to the future of mobile learning. It is also an opportunity to network and celebrate our community and plan together for another year of m-learning research and initiatives before we meet again at mLearn 2017.

This year’s theme is Mobile learning futures: Sustaining quality research and practice in mobile learning. mLearn 2016 is kindly hosted by the University of Technology Sydney, and has been put together thanks to the generous efforts of the organizers led by Dr. Wan Ng and Dr. Laurel Evelyn Dyson, with support from IAmLearn. We cannot thank them enough for making this event happen and for welcoming us at UTS.

The mLearn 2016 conference program includes keynotes by Mark Pesce, Susi Steigler-Peters, and Professor John Traxler, as well as an array of papers and presentations on theories, research and pedagogy of mobile learning. I’d like to invite all mLearn 2016 attendees to participate in the walking tour of Sydney, our Monday IAmLearn AGM and reception as well as the conference dinner. We are also inviting those of you who cannot join us in person to follow mLearn 2016 on Twitter at @mLearn2016 and #mLearn2016. Enjoy the dialogue.

See you at mLearn 2016 (in person and online)!

Dr. Agnieszka (Aga) Palalas

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What's Happening: News and Notes

Teaching & Learning with Mobile Technologies Vodcasts

IAmLearn's Rob Power recently hosted a series of live vodcasts. The events featured a eight prominent IAmLearn researchers and practitioners, who discussed topics including:


Watch the video below for Rob's conversation with IAmLearn President Dr. Aga Palalas on the challenges with arriving at a single definition of what mobile learning is (and to access the rest of the videos in the playlist).


The Teaching & Learning with Mobile Technologies Vodcasts are available on YouTube under a Creative Commons Licence - so feel free to share and reuse!

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John Traxler: The Future of Mobile Learning

IAmLearn Vice-President Professor John Traxler recently spoke with Stifterverband to discuss the changing face of mobile learning research and practice.

When it comes to digital learning teachers no longer have control over what device their students are learning with. They bring their own device, their smartphone and their tablet computer. And this is a nothing but a revolution in higher education, says John Traxler of Wolverhampton University, one of the pioneers of mobile learning. So how do teachers and universities cope with that new situation? (Stifterverband, 2016)

Watch the full interview here...


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NATO Future Online Learning

Dr. Helen Crompton

On 25th-26th April NATO held a meeting/webinar to bring together academia and NATO-wide subject matter experts to identify the best practices in online learning and discuss how they could be best leveraged for NATO. The event was held at the ACT Innovation Hub that is based on campus at Old Dominion University, Norfolk, Virginia, USA.

The ACT Innovation Hub is self-described as a professional international defense organization environment where college staffs and students can research, practice and collaborate with the NATO-wide subject matter experts community. The Innovation Hub is infamous for its development of online collaborative communities supported by genuine tools and techniques allowing its members to work efficiently beyond time and space.

I attended part of the event, and I am sharing notes from those sessions.

I sat on the panel with about 12 others. About 2/3 of the panel were military leaders of some type. This was broadcasted live via webinar and various others across the globe joined us to listen in and to also present.

Topics Covered
  • Online Learning and Education Science, theories and applications\
  • Best practice in Online Learning Strategies, Methodologies, Techniques and Tools
  • How to best leverage Online Learning and its various aspects in support of NATO?

The discussions started with presentations and discussions on the topics of:
  • How training needs are determined
  • The infrastructure of particular divisions
  • Education and training opportunities offered by NATO and non-NATO participants e.g. e-ITEP which can be accessed at http://e-itep.act.nato.int/homepage/LoginPage.aspx?returnURL=%2f 
  • How NATO is organized
  • Scholarly findings of how students learn

The NATO have an elearning program and the courses are all developed in iLias, which is open source software. There are 69 nations who access the courses. The ADDIE framework is typically used to design many of the courses. The courses are synchronous and asynchronous, although the majority are asynchronous and they often used the term “anytime, anywhere learning” although few appeared to be connecting with mlearning but with main desktop and laptop computers. The presenters described the use of electronic simulations, simple learning resources, and interactive e-lessons.

Those on the panel spoke about the need for students to be online as travel budgets are small and relocation of educational institutions is hard to impossible. For the future of learning they want faster-better-cheaper learning and training. They also want to move towards all training modules to be cloud-based. It is worth noting that NATO does not own any training centers.

The presentations moved to actual online teaching and learning strategies. I presented during this time and with a presentation time of 10-15 minutes I covered a small strategy of connecting students with the instructor in asynchronous online environments, I covered the literature about the feeling of isolation that many students feel, even in large online classes and how this can negatively impact course grades and completion. It is good for the students to know that there is a person behind the instructions, grades, and feedback.

The two strategies I shared where video visuals and animated personas. For the video visuals I talked about including a small inset video of the instructor so they could see the person behind the voice and gain the added advantage of seeing body language and expression during video lectures. Examples of programs include LiteCam HD, Camtasia (expensive), ScreenCastoMatic (free). The other strategy was to create animated personas. For this strategy, I shared my iPad screen and demonstrated the Telligami app. I showed the participants how they can create an animated person that looks like them and presents the information from the voice recording that the instructor has made. This latter strategy is a good way for an instructor that does not like to actually appear on video.

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Notes from International Mobile Learning Festival 2016

IAmLearn's Dr. Helen Crompton presented a keynote address at the International Mobile Learning Festival, entitled Moving Towards a Mobile Learning Landscape: Effective Device Integration. IMLF took place May 27-28, 2016 in Bankok, Thailand. The following is the abstract for Dr. Crompton's keynote address:



Mobile devices transcend the educational affordances provided by conventional tethered electronic and traditional learning. However, empirical findings show that educators are not integrating technology effectively into the curriculum. In this study, a thematic synthesis methodology was used to develop and present a framework for thinking about the integration of mobile devices in teaching and learning. The mobile learning (mlearning) integration framework is comprised of four main parts: beliefs, resources, methods, and purpose. These four areas are elucidated to reveal the many sub-components that determine how technology is integrated. An ecological framework is then presented to demonstrate how the individual parts of the initial framework operate through a complex, interconnected network of systems involving personal and environmental factors.

Dr. Crompton also shares her thoughts on the topic, and her keynote:

"Over the past few years I have been thinking about how educators make decisions about integrating mobile learning. I have worked for the International Society for Technology in Education for a number of years and traveled to places across the US to provide professional development on mobile learning. Many of these educators have self-identified that training is all they needed to effectively incorporate these technologies. However, I found that the amount and level of mobile learning integration has greatly varied after the professional development and that there are many other parts involved. This thematic synthesis had me unravel what all those parts were and ecologically how they came to influence that educator."

Here is a link to the proceedings that provide more information on this keynote and all the other great presentations.  You can also click the following link to read more of Helen Crompton's IMLF Highlight Notes.

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Nurturing Communities of Inquiry with DojoIBL

Angel Suarez Fernandez – Open Universiteit, Netherlands

Inquiry-based learning (IBL) is a process of understanding, developing inquiry skills and constructing knowledge sparked by curiosity. Very often, these inquiry processes take place in collaborative settings, described by (Pierce, 1877; Garrison & Anderson, 2003) as Community of Inquiries (CoI). The term Community of an Inquiry concerns with the nature of knowledge formation in IBL, and it refers to the continuous exploration of a meaningful topic for the community members (students), where they engage in social interactions to generate shared understanding.

At the Open Universiteit of the Netherlands, we have developed the DojoIBL platform to support IBL processes. DojoIBL is an open source platform that builds on a PaaS (Platform as a Service) cloud based architecture deployed in Google App Engine (GAE). It is a Learning Content Management System that provides tools to structure collaborative inquiry processes. Based on elements like phases, activities and roles, designers and facilitators can easily create inquiry structures that later can be used by groups of students. For each inquiry structure created, designers can add inquiry-runs only accessible for a group of students. That means, DojoIBL can easily handle several groups of students working under the same inquiry structure whereas they work independently from each others groups. DojoIBL implements an individual messaging component and an integrated notification system for each inquiry-run to support collaboration and contextualized communication. Additionally, an interactive timeline with access to each individual contribution is provided to support social, activity and group awareness.

In short, DojoIBL is an intuitive and collaborative platform to structure inquiry-based learning processes. If you are a teacher, designer or facilitator willing to change education to provide better learning experiences to students, contact us and give DojoIBL a try (Angel.suarez@ou.nl).

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GEOSchool Day 2016

Christian Sailor

Almost 300 students defied the bad weather at the GEOSchool Day and set out to compete against other students from primary and secondary school. They participated in the GeoGame Battles of the semiannual GEOSummit, the official Swiss conference for geoinformation. The students used the newest geoinformation technology and playfully faced different real world challenges by mastering a battery of tasks both indoors and outdoors.

The indoor games included smartphone-based augmented paper maps, a wind farm simulation game in virtual environment, as well as a mystery eye tracking game.


Outdoors, the students could explore their skills as a pitcher by estimating distances of their throws using professional surveying tools, use an augmented reality sandbox for to understand the mechanics behind flow maps, assemble an ultra-sized geo puzzle game or even play a game of guessing sketches that were drawn by their classmates, using the GPS-tracks they left behind while running around outside.


One of the many highlights was the MEGAGEOGame, a game where the students had to master a total of 7 different missions in the City of Bern. The participating classes were assigned to different groups, where each student took in a different role, such as that of the Navigator, Communicator or Data-Collector. The classes then competed in, amongst others, seeking hidden treasures, finding unique objects and identifying pedestrians with wearables. The students in particular remembered the most difficult mission, i.e., a collaboratively sketched equilateral triangle and Swiss cross using their individual GPS-positions.


However, two classes outdid the others and were announced the champions of the GEOSchool Day 2016. The reward included – as it should be in Switzerland – a huge bucket of chocolates and a treasure chest full of traditional card games.


At the end, 300 students left the GEOSchool Day knowing they gained a deep insight into the technologies and applications of today’s geoinformation systems and what is more important, they left wanting to learn more about this field of education and industry, i.e. signing up for a course of study or applying for a job.

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WEKIT: A New European Community on Augmented Reality and Wearables-Enhanced Learning

Mikhail Fominykh - Project manager at Europlan UK Ltd

The European consortium implementing the three-year Horizon 2020 Project WEKIT: Wearable Experience for Knowledge Intensive Training is announcing a call for expression of interest to join a community of stakeholders willing to contribute to the design and later testing of a new technology platform and to benefit from the new opportunities this area offers.

This platform will be used for industrial learning and training employing augmented reality and wearable technology. The new concept of wearable experience will bring mobile technology-enhanced learning to a new level by converging knowledge in the form of experience instead of information. WEKIT captures expert experience using a combination of wearable sensors and transfers it to trainees via immersive, in-situ learning. Trainees get access to and benefit from tacit expert experience which goes beyond common knowledge embodied in technical documentation. As a result, the learning and economic effectiveness of training is projected to significantly increase and to improve operational performance and satisfaction of workers.

You can learn more about the WEKIT concept by watching our introductory video...



For more information on the WEKIT project, visit www.wekit.eu.

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Overcoming Challenges in Mobile Learning Across Sectors: K-12, Higher Education, Business

School leaders, researchers, teachers, business organizations, and universities around the globe are striving to answer important questions about how or under what conditions mobile technology can benefit learning for particular students, tasks, and situations. But no single industry, IT innovation, school sector, country or institution alone can answer these questions. To address these shared challenges, Qualcomm Inc. and the Mobile Technology Learning Center at the University of San Diego are conducting a research study that aims to convene a cross-sector dialogue and formally document current challenges faced by K-20 education and private enterprise in STEM-related disciplines/careers when implementing mobile learning initiatives.

37 US national and international experts in mobile learning participated in a Delphi study which included three rounds of surveys and a one-day convening hosted by the Mobile Technology Learning Center and Qualcomm at the University of San Diego. The purpose of the convening was to share findings from the study and identify opportunities to implement one or more solutions through cross-sector partnerships.

We hope to learn a lot from the outcomes of this study and to cultivate cross sector partnerships to help each other better overcome challenges in mobile learning.

Watch the video from our convening at the University of San Diego and to learn more about the study...


Visit our website to learn more about the study.

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Upcoming Events

International Conference on Knowledge Technologies and Data-driven Business (iKnow) 

iKnow 2016 will take place on 18-19 October 2016 in Graz, Austria. Knowledge Technologies have dramatically changed over this period. i-KNOW 2016 aims at advancing research at the intersection of disciplines such as Knowledge Discovery, Semantics, Information Visualization, Visual Analytics, Social (Semantic) and Ubiquitous Computing. The goal of integrating these approaches is to augment human intelligence by designing tools and services which interact naturally with humans, learn from their experiences and generate and evaluate evidence-based hypotheses – following the cognitive computing paradigm. That is, we interpret cognitive computing as the convergence of various knowledge technologies research fields.


24th International Conference on Computers in Education (ICCE 2016) 

ICCE 2016 will take place from November 28 - December 2, 2016, in Mumbai, India. The conference theme is Think Global, Act Local: Contextualizing Technology-Enhanced Education. ICCE 2016 will feature a sub-conference on Classroom, Ubiquitous, and Mobile Technologies Enhanced Learning. You can learn more about this event from the ICCE 2016 Conference Website.


International Conference MOOCs, Informal Language Learning, and Mobility

The International Conference on MOOCS, Informal Language Learning, and Mobililty, will take place on 20-21 October 2016, in Milton Keynes, UK. Topics include:

  • MOOCs - design, learning, teaching, quality assurance, etc
  • CALL and its normalisation
  • Mobile-assisted language teaching and learning
  • Informal language learning
  • Learning to learn languages
  • Student mobility
  • Virtual classrooms, eLearning, and ePortfolio


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Contributing to the Newsletter

Do you have an upcoming event, research study, posting, or a story about something happening in the mobile learning world that you would like to share through our newsletter? Have you participated in a recent podcast or vodcast that might interest our members? Share your ideas and resources by getting in touch with Rob Power (robpower@hotmail.com) or with any of the team members.






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Friday, May 20, 2016

IAmLearn Newsletter - 2016 Supplemental - Summer mLearning Vodcast Series

Teaching & Learning with Mobile Technologies Summer Vodcast Series

IAmLearn's Dr. Rob Power chats with experts from the International Association for Mobile Learning in this series of live (15-20 minutes each) vodcasts covering topics about Teaching & Learning with Mobile Technologies. Feel free to tune in for the live broadcasts at the dates and times listed, or view the recordings anytime afterwards. Pre-registration is not required.

Refer to http://educ5199g.weebly.com/vodcasts.html for the latest vodcast schedules, times, and links.



Deploying Mobile Technologies in Education

In this vodcast, Rob chats with IAmLearn founding director, and Technology Enhanced Knowledge Research Institute (TEKRI) member Dr. Mohamed Ally about the arguments for and against integrating mobile technologies in formal education, and key considerations when implementing a Bring Your Own Device (BYOD) program.

Live Vodcast Date: Wednesday, June 8, 2016, 15:00 EDT
Link: https://youtu.be/5d9yqcs7kgU


Defining mLearning

In this vodcast, Rob chats with IAmLearn president Dr. Aga Palalas to discuss the difficulties in defining what exactly mobile learning is, why mobile technologies are important in teaching and learning, and the role of IAmLearn.

Live Vodcast Date: Tuesday, June 21, 11:00 EDT
Link: https://youtu.be/9bEhnrZCuXc


Future Trends in Mobile Learning

In this vodcast, Rob chats with former IAmLearn president Dr. Marcus Specht about the future of mobile learning, including the increasing roles of Augmented Reality (AR) and Virtual Reality (VR) applications, and wearable technologies.

Live Vodcast Date: Wednesday, June 22, 2016, 03:00 EDT
​Link: https://youtu.be/jOkif4Dv7uU


Scalability and Sustainability in Mobile Learning

In this vodcast, Rob chats with IAmLearn vice-president John Traxler, the "world's first professor of mobile learning," about scalability and sustainability with mobile learning projects, and their implications for teachers and educational institutions.

Live Vodcast Date: Monday, July 11, 2016, 14:00 EDT
Link: https://youtu.be/JppsreT6M34


Mobile Technologies and STEM

In this vodcast, Rob chats with Dr. Mike Sharples of the Open University of the UK about the use of mobile technologies to facilitate STEM education, and scientific inquiry using the Sense-it app.

Live Vodcast Date: Tuesday, July 12, 2016, 14:00 EDT
Link: https://youtu.be/4dwALRLYiCc



Teacher Preparation and Pedagogical Approaches to Mobile Learning

​In this vodcast, Rob chats with IAmLearn members and Ohio State University researchers Dr. Dean Cristol and Dr. Belinda Gimbert about the challenges in preparing teachers to integrate mobile technologies in teaching and learning practice, and their work investigating pedagogical approaches to mLearning.

Live Vodcast Date: Monday, July 18, 11:00 EDT
Link: https://youtu.be/Tu0NHpnY7W8


User Interface Considerations for Mobile Learning

In this vodcast, Rob chats with Geoff Stead, Director of Digital and New Product Development at Cambridge English, about user interface and accessibility considerations for mobile learning instructional design and resource development.

Live Vodcast Date: Friday, July 22, 2016, 14:00 EDT
Link: https://youtu.be/z76gTONYZ5E


Mobile Assisted Language Learning

In this vodcast, Rob chats with former IAmLearn president and Open University of the UK researcher Dr. Agnes Kukulska-Hulme about how mobile learning strategies and mobile applications can be used to help with language learning.

Live Vodcast Date: Tuesday, August 9, 2016, 14:00 EDT
Link: https://youtu.be/EXLVhfNcpCk



Download Summer Vodcast Series Poster (.pdf)

Monday, May 2, 2016

IAmLearn Newsletter - 2016 - 2


Special Edition - Meet the Team!

As part of the International Association for Mobile Learning (IAmLearn)'s efforts to increase engagement and keep members up-to-date on what's happening in the world of mobile learning research and practice, the IAmLearn Communications Committee engages a team of student contributors. We've just finalized arrangements with three team members from different regions to act as content contributors for the next year. They'll be collecting information and preparing pieces to post in our quarterly newsletters, and via our social media channels.

This supplementary edition of the IAmLearn Newsletter is being published to introduce the team members, and to let you know how you can contribute, as well. Also in this special edition, we have two reports for IAmLearn Secretary Dr. Jocelyn Wishart on mobile learning events that she has recently participated in.

Contents

Meet the Team Members
  • Executive Committee Members
  • Nicole (Nikki) Berezin
  • Song Yulin
  • Maria Aristeidou
In the News
  • IAmLearn at UNESCO MLW 2016
  • IADIS 2016
Getting Involved


Meet the Team Members


 Executive Committee Members

Aga Palalas: agaizabella@rogers.com
Rob Power: robpower@hotmail.com
IAmLearn's communications efforts are being spearheaded by Association President Dr. Aga Palalas and Communications Officer / Member-at-Large Dr. Rob Power. You can always reach out to either of us with questions, comments, or newsletter story ideas.

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Nicole (Nikki) Berezin

Nicole Berezin brings unquenchable curiosity and tenacity to collaborative teams in her work as an Instructional Designer. She spent the first 14 years of her career as a Job Coach and Training and Development Manager in companies supporting people with disabilities.  After facilitating far too many classes as a transmission focused talking head, she returned to school and dove into the digital ocean and is learning something new everyday.  Her experiences as a trainee, trainer and information consumer drive her to join teams that create innovative and interactive learning solutions.  She is currently working with Mathematics Faculty to build design skills and capacity into their subject expertise at Santa Fe Community College.  Nicole can be found anytime, anywhere on just about any device, exploring learning and evaluation within blended learning systems.  She is tapping skills she built during an amazing opportunity to work on a transnational team , Ghana, Canada, US to assist a Ghanaian University in creating a blended Physician Assistant Program. Her current goal involves collaborating on and creating an innovative, culturally responsive assessment tool to capture “ a snapshot”  and measurement of the learning that occurs in the systems we build.

You can reach Nicole at nberezin71@gmail.com.

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Song Yulin

Mrs. Song Yulin is an associate professor, head of English Department of International Law in College of Foreign Studies, Liaoning University, China, giving English courses to undergraduate English majors. Her research interests are mobile learning, especially mobile assisted language learning, mobile learning and intercultural communication. She has great interests of exploring mobile learning via social media in foreign language learning and intercultural communication. From September 2014 to September 2015, she was an academic visitor in University of Wolverhampton, UK, hosted by Professor John Traxler, doing research on mobile learning and intercultural communication. She is happy to work for the International Association for Mobile Learning and glad to help to link mobile learning in China to the world.

You can reach Song at lindersong@126.com.

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Maria Aristeidou

Maria Aristeidou is a Postdoctoral Researcher at the Institute of Educational Technology of The Open University in the UK. Her main research interest focuses on the design and evaluation of engaging web-based and mobile learning technologies. In her doctoral research Maria concentrated on the engagement of citizens in online communities of scientific inquiries. She explored how to design, create and maintain online communities, how to monitor and enhance the participation within the community, and how to support informal science learning through web-based platforms and mobile applications.  Prior to joining The Open University, Maria obtained an MSc in Technology Education and Digital Systems and a BA in Education Science and Primary Education. Maria has been active in European and International associations and conferences for Technology-Enhanced Learning and she is excited to be able to contribute her expertise to the International Association for Mobile Learning.

You can reach Maria at maria.aristeidou@open.ac.uk.

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In the News

Dr. Jocelyn Wishart
IAmLearn's Executive Committee Secretary, Dr. Jocelyn Wishart, recently participated in the UNESCO Mobile Learning Week and the IADIS 2016 mobile learning, and shares her reflections on these events. 











IAmLearn at UNESCO MLW 2016

UNESCO World Headquarters in Paris, France
I was invited to represent IAmLearn at a plenary debate on ‘improving pedagogy and the relevance of mobile learning’ at UNESCO Mobile Learning Week 2016 in Paris. The week itself opened with an international  webinar set up to debate the extent to which mobile technology can facilitate learning & strengthen the quality of education. Kicked off by IAmLearn founder Mike Sharples with examples of large scale mobile learning projects such as English in Action; the debate included presentations from over 20 other experts presenting from across the globe and including IAmLearn member Shawn Gross. You can watch the debate at www.effdebate.org/eff17 and read the associated conversations on Twitter under #EFF17. Following the webinar I travelled to Paris where the UNESCO building is sited almost next to the Eiffel tower.  Details of mobile learning week itself are at http://www.unesco.org/new/en/mlw and the Twitter contributions are tagged under #mlw2016.

The week was set out under three thematic tracks: making quality education a reality for all learners, improving pedagogy and the relevance of learning and enhancing management, planning and evaluation.  There were usually four sessions running in parallel so I was only able to capture a small part of the rich variety amongst the sessions however, the range of international contributions in this variety clearly emphasized the global potential for mobile learning opportunities.  At times I was concerned that too many people were including classroom based e-learning delivered via tablets however, at others, I had my breath taken away by the sheer scale of some of the out of class literacy and language learning initiatives or the way in which colleagues are using mobile technologies to enhance context relevant creative and authentic learning opportunities.

Interest in, and sustainability for, mobile learning was evident throughout. UNESCO support is steered by last year’s Qingdao Declaration on ICT and Post-2015 Education. The declaration includes the statement that to achieve UNESCO’s goal of inclusive and equitable quality education and lifelong learning by 2030, ICT – including mobile learning – must be harnessed to strengthen education systems, knowledge dissemination, information access, quality and effective learning, and more efficient service provision. Clearly the future is mobile and whilst I was able to meet up with IAmlearn members including Trish Andrews, Eliot Soloway, Cathie Norris and Nilgun Keskin as well as Shawn Gross, IAmLearn itself could have done with a more central presence. The fact that there is no registration charge for MLW means it attracts an excellent range of presenters and delegates.

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IADIS 2016

Vilamoura, Algarve, Portugal
The IADIS 2016 mobile learning conference took place on 9-11 April in a well appointed hotel in the outskirts of Vilamoura in the Algarve on the South coast of Portugal. This is a small international conference, 12th in the series, run by the International Association for the Development of the Information Society (IADIS) and co-located with the 14th edition of the International Conference on e-Society and the 9th IADIS International Conference on Information Systems.

The conference addresses society on the move as well as mobile learning via handheld devices and opened with a keynote on virtual, creative intelligent agents or 'cyber-companions' and their potential use to supporting knowledge sharing and learning in cyber-social setting from Andreas Dengel of the German Research Center for Artificial Intelligence and the University of Kaiserslautern, Germany. Highlights of the other presentations on Day One included Bente Meyer's focus on observing classroom spaces and finding that children using handheld tablets work in more flexible, personalized and diverse ways, Matthias Teine explaining how bite-sized learning units can be structured in a thoughtful way for the elderly new to using iPads and smartphones, Michele Notari showing how students wearing wristbands that monitor health and fitness developed their eHealth literacy and, last but not least a lively tutorial workshop on ethical considerations in mobile learning. More details at http://mlearning-conf.org/ or by looking up the Twitter hashtag #ML2016.

On Day Two highlights included two presentations by IAmLearn members with Willy Fahlman calling on leaders in the Canadian healthcare system to get involved to ensure the successes seen in work-based mobile learning for nurses and to address the organizational contextual factors including policy and support systems necessary to make this mode of learning sustainable and Dave Parsons reporting that, while teachers in New Zealand and their students using mobile devices in schools are frequently engaged in activities that utilize a range of mobile learning affordances, they tend to focus on simple, supplementary activities such as taking photographs and making videos. Oh... and a memorable boat trip in the setting sun to a local fish restaurant.

Day Three concluded the conference with more reflections on and ways forward for new tools and devices to support mobile learning including smart watches, augmented reality (Jose Miguel Mota and colleagues from the University of Cadiz won best paper for their report on their new app VEDILS that allows engineering students to see 2D technical drawings in 3 dimensions) and pedagogical strategies for using mobile devices inside and outside the classroom.

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Getting Involved

Contributing to the IAmLearn Newsletter

Do you have an upcoming event, research study, posting, or a story about something happening in the mobile learning world that you would like to share through our newsletter? Have you participated in a recent podcast or vodcast that might interest our members? Share your ideas and resources by getting in touch with Rob Power (robpower@hotmail.com) or with any of the team members.

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Thursday, March 10, 2016

IAmLearn Newsletter - 2016 - 1

In This Edition

IAmLearn Executive Notes
  • Greetings from the President
  • Executive Committee Elections
mLearn Notes: From the Mediterranean to the Land Down Under
  • mLearn 2015
  • mLearn 2016
  • A New Home for All Things mLearn
What's Happening: News & Notes
  • Broadcast Thoughts: PodCasts and VodCosts
  • Reflections from mLearnCon 2015
  • AU Goes Mobile
  • What Killed the Mobile Learning Dream - Traxler
  • Global Mobile Awards 2016
  • Mobile Learning Research Project from Poland
Upcoming Events
  • UNESCO Mobile Learning Week
  • FocusOn Mobile
  • 2016 AMO Awards
Contributing to the Newsletter


IAmLearn Executive Notes

Greetings from the President

Dear IAmLearn Colleagues,

Welcome to this first 2016 edition of the IAmLearn newsletter! Together with my colleagues at the International Association for Mobile Learning (IAmLearn), I would like to wish you again a very happy, healthy, and prosperous 2016!

I am honoured and privileged to assume the role of President of IAmLearn. I am deeply grateful to my predecessor, Marcus Specht, for his leadership and contributions to IAmLearn. I would like to also thank the Executive Board and the IAmLearn members for electing me and putting their trust in me as I preside the association for the next two years. I look forward to continuing this important work toward fulfilling the mission of IAmLearn, serving its members, and expanding the reach of the association. In this special role, I am supported by my colleagues on the Executive Committee – John Traxler (Vice President), Jocelyn Wishart (Secretary), Tom Brown (Treasurer), Robert Power (Communications Officer), Dean Cristol (Member-at-large), and Marcus Specht (Past President). I am humbled by their expertise and achievements, and inspired by the commitment of the Executive Committee and the past presidents toward the IAmLearn mission. We are lucky to have some of the most talented and accomplished experts and leaders from across the globe steering our association.

IAmLearn is a premier international non-profit membership organization promoting excellence in research, development, and application of mobile and contextual learning. It is custodian of the annual mLearn international conference series and manages a website (www.iamlearn.org) to collate and disseminate information about new projects, emerging technologies, and teaching resources.

Throughout the upcoming months of 2016, we are looking to serve you even better as we continue working to be a member-oriented organization. We must come together to share ideas and resources so we can reshape and create a better future for the next generation of students, faculty, researchers, and other m-learning practitioners in academia and industry. Hence, I invite you to get involved by working on IAmLearn committees and sharing with us any ideas and communication artifacts that you would want to see disseminated through our IAmLearn website, newsletter, Twitter, and Facebook.  You can find details on how you can exchange information about your projects, resources, and other mobile and contextual learning materials at the end of this edition of the IAmLearn Newsletter.

I am also very excited about the upcoming mLearn 2016 conference, this year with a theme “Mobile learning futures: Sustaining quality research and practice in mobile learning.” More details about this three-day event are included in this edition of the newsletter.

I also strongly urge you to get involved in IAmLearn by expressing your ideas, inquiries, and hopes via the email addresses listed at the end of this Newsletter. I will continue our dialogue through the IAmLearn newsletter and social media channels. There are some exciting changes coming to IAmLearn next month. Make sure to visit our IAmLearn Facebook regularly.

It is my utmost pleasure to serve as your new President!

Yours Sincerely,
Agnieszka (Aga) Palalas, Ed.D.


Executive Committee Elections

A few changes to the IAmLearn Executive Committee following elections held at the 2015 Annual General Meeting during mLearn 2015. Dr. Agnieszka Palalas (Athabasca University) was elected Association President. Dr. Marcus Specht (Open Universiteit Nederland), who was elected to that post at mLearn 2013 in Doha, Qatar, now moves into the Past President position on the Executive. Dr. Rob Power (Fraser Health / University of Ontario Institute of Technology) was re-elected as a Member-at-Large, and has undertaken the role of Communications Officer. Dr. Dean Cristol (Ohio State University) was also elected as a Member-at-Large, and comes in as a new face on the Executive Committee.

You can check in on the IAmLearn website where you can always find the latest information on the Executive Committee Members and Association Directors.

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From the Mediterranean to the Land Down Under

mLearn 2015 - From Small Ripples to Massive Open Waters

The mLearn conference series is known for travelling to different countries, in different parts of the world, each year. 2015 saw the idea of the traveling mobile learning conference go truly mobile. mLearn 2015 took place in October 2015 on “the high seas” of the Mediterranean. The conference took place aboard Royal Caribbean’s Splendor of the Seas, which departed from Venice, Italy, and made several ports of call throughout the region. The conference offered participants a unique blend of “mobile” learning that included the typical academic and practical sessions of a conference, and the variety of local cultural highlights from the Mediterranean and Adriatic Seas. The mLearn 2015 Conference Proceedings are available through Springer.


mLearn 2016 - Mobile Learning Futures: Sustaining Quality Research and Practice in Mobile Learning

The mobile learning community will converge on Sydney, Australia from Oct 24-26, 2016. The 15th World Conference on Mobile and Contextual Learning (mLearn 2016) will be hosted by the University of Technology Sydney. The 2016 conference theme is Mobile Learning Futures: Sustaining Quality Research and Practice in Mobile Learning.

The mLearn 2016 paper submission system is now open, and the deadline for submission is May 30, 2016. Full details can be found on the Call for Papers section of the conference website.


A New Home for All Things mLearn

As part of the IAmLearn Communications Team's ongoing efforts to streamline communications with members and the wider mobile learning community, we're moving towards a single point-of-contact to get information about the mLearn Conference Series. You can already access information about mLearn 2016 via the IAmLearn website's new mLearn page, where you can also find links to archived versions of the past conference sites. Our aim is to turn this page into a one-stop-shop for all future conferences.

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What's Happening: News & Notes

Broadcast Thoughts: PodCasts and VodCasts

One of the longest standing debates amongst mLearning researchers and practitioners is the actual definition of mobile learning. IAmLearn Secretary Dr. Jocelyn Wishart and President Dr. Aga Palalas recently participated in a podcast about defining mLearning. We invite you to listen to the podcast, and share your thoughts on what mLearning is in the comments section for this edition of the IAmLearn Newsletter.

 
Dr. Jocelyn Wishart and Dr. Aga Palalas on Defining Mobile Learning


IAmLearn Executive Committee members Dr. Dean Cristol and Dr. Rob Power recently "sat down" for a vodcast to discuss emerging trends in educational technology and mobile learning. The session used Google Hangouts On Air to broadcast live to participants in the Ohio State University's Literacy, New Media, and Creative Pedagogies for Classrooms undergraduate Education course, and is available now via YouTube.



Reflections from mLearnCon 2015

IAmLearn President Dr. Aga Palalas had the opportunity to network with a number of mobile learning and educational technology specialists at mLearnCon 2015. The event, organized by the eLearning Guild, took place June 10-12, 2015, in Austin, Texas. Dr. Palalas recorded a number of candid conversations about their experiences at mLearnCon, the value of the conference, and their views on key issues in the mobile learning sphere. Dr. Palalas interviewed three eLearning and mLearning experts who are published authors, consultants and regular presenters at local and international conferences: Joe Ganci, Phil Cowcill, and Krista Hildner.

Watch the following video compilation of her mLearnCon Colleague Connections.



In the next video, Dr. Palalas talks to colleagues, including Krista Hildner, about the Relationship between mLearning and Performance Support.


The Future of Mobile Learning was the subject of conversations between Dr. Palalas, Phil Cowcill and other colleagues.


Access the full playlist of Dr. Palalas’s mLearnCon Colleague Connections. Check out the Upcoming Events section in this newsletter for information on FocusOn Mobile - the evolution of the mLearnCon series for 2016.


AU Goes Mobile

IAmLearn Founding Director Dr. Mohamed Ally was recently featured in a Globe & Mail story about increasing uptake of mobile learning strategies, including at Athabasca University. The story also featured Hanny Alsahzly, a former student in AU's Master of Education in Distance Education program. You can check out Learning untethered: How mobile is enhancing how students learn via the Globe & Mail, and AU's post about the story, Mobile Learning - Plugged in Across AU.






What Killed the Mobile Learning Dream - Traxler

IAmLearn Vice-President Professor John Traxler recently spoke at JISC's Digifest about the current state of mobile learning research and practical implementation efforts. He told participants that "mobile learning has stalled," and challenged them to "examine what's happened and how can it get back on track." Check out the message from Professor Traxler's presentation What killed the mobile learning dream? via JISC.







Global Mobile Awards 2016

The 2016 Global Mobile (Glomo) Awards were announced at the GSMA Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, Spain, which took place from February 22-25, 2016. Worldreader and Opera's entry, Worldreader Mobile, took top honors in the Best Mobile Innovation for Education category. Worldreader Mobile is an application that uses extreme compression technology to provide access to digital books to over 350 million users worldwide, using very little bandwidth and devices that they already own. The 2016 Glomo Awards judges noted of Worldreader Mobile that it is a “highly effective and useful platform-agnostic compression system, providing social development opportunities – borne out by the huge market take-up.”

You can use your mobile phone to check out Worldreader Mobile, and you can get an overview of the application from the Glomo Awards site. You can also check out the Glomo Awards website for the full list of winners in all categories.


Mobile Learning Research Project from Poland

Currently, our company from Poland is preparing an application to get funding for a project regarding mobile social learning for families struggling with chronic diseases.

At the moment, we are looking for a scientist who would help us to do the research phase as well as to develop a methodology of social learning on mobile devices for families with chronic illnesses. We would like to cooperate with a researcher who is interested in this topic or specializes in the area. The target group is very specific so it’s important that the expert knows this area or would like to go deeper regarding this subject. You can read more about the research project to date HERE.

The best person would be from Poland, Bulgaria, Slovenia, Italy or Turkey.
Please contact us: ikostrzewa@domszkolen.com

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Upcoming Events

UNESCO Mobile Learning Week (March 7-11, 2016)

UNESCO's Mobile Learning Week has been scheduled for March 7-11, 2016 at the UNESCO Headquarters in Paris France. This year's theme is Innovating for Quality. A number of IAmLearn members are planning to attend the event, and we'll be posting a newsletter update with their summaries and impressions. If you cannot attend the event, you can still catch some of the highlights. UNESCO will be streaming recordings of some of the key proceedings online.

FocusOn Mobile - Austin, TX (June 8-10, 2016)

Click on the image link to go to the FocusOn Mobile conference website
Part of the FocusOn Learning conference, FocusOn Mobile "continues the industry-leading conversations of mLearnCon that explore cutting-edge examples of mobile being used to transform learning and performance support."




2016 AMO Awards - Shanghai, China (June 29 - July 1, 2016)

Following on the 2016 GSMA Mobile World congress in February, the 2016 Asia Mobile Awards will take place from June 29 - July 1, 2016, in shanghai, China. Entries are still being accepted in a number of categories, including Mobile Apps, Connected Lifestyle, and Technology Innovation. Nominated entries will be announced in June on the AMO Awards website.

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Contributing to the IAmLearn Newsletter

Do you have an upcoming event, research study, posting, or a story about something happening in the mobile learning world that you would like to share through our newsletter? Have you participated in a recent podcast or vodcast that might interest our members? Share your ideas and resources by getting in touch with the Rob Power (robpower@hotmail.com) or Nicole Berezin (nberezin@unm.edu)

Your thoughts and comments are also welcomed via the Comments section for this edition of the IAmLearn Newsletter (below). Feel free to post your comments about anything from this edition. We'd really love to hear your thoughts, particularly about Dr. Palalas' and Dr. Wishart's podcast and defining mobile learning!

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