To date, developments in mobile learning are driven by pedagogic necessity, technological innovation, funding opportunity and the perceived inadequacies of conventional e-learning. These developments have taken place within relatively narrow educational discourses (see Traxler and Kukulska-Hulme 2005; Kukulska-Hulme and Traxler 2007 for analyses of a sample) and the same is true for pedagogical podcasting at this stage in its development.
During the first decade of the 21st century, mobile learning publications (Kukulska-Hulme et al. 2005; JISC 2005) and conference proceedings (for example, Attewell and Savill-Smith 2004) have put case studies and their evaluations into the public domain – and increasingly these feature podcasting. In looking at these case studies, Kukulska-Hulme and Traxler (2007) see emergent categories:
- Technology-driven mobile learning – a specific technological innovation is deployed to demonstrate technical feasibility and pedagogic possibility, perhaps the new iPhone
- Miniature but portable e-learning – mobile, wireless and handheld technologies are used to re-enact approaches and solutions found in ‘conventional’ e-learning, perhaps by importing an established e-learning technology such as a Virtual Learning Environment (VLE) onto mobile devices
- Connected classroom learning – the same technologies are used in a class-room settings to support static collaborative learning perhaps connected to other classroom technologies; personal response systems, graphing calculators, PDAs linked to interactive whiteboards
- Mobile training/performance support – the technologies are used to improve the productivity and efficiency of mobile workers by delivering information and support just-in-time and in context for their immediate priorities
- Large-scale implementation – the deployment of mobile technologies at an institutional or departmental level to learn about organizational issues, for example Mobiles Enhancing Learning and Support (MELaS, www.wlv.ac.uk/celt/MELaS) funded by the Joint Information Systems Committee (JISC)
- Inclusion, enabling and diversity – using assorted mobile and wireless technologies to enhance wider educational access and participation, for example personal information management for students with dyslexia
- Informal, personalized, situated mobile learning – the same core technologies are enhanced with additional unique functionality, for example location-awareness or video-capture, and deployed to deliver educational experiences that would otherwise be difficult or impossible; informal context-aware information in museum spaces
- Remote/rural development mobile learning – the technologies are used to address environmental and infrastructural challenges to delivering and supporting education where ‘conventional’ e-learning technologies would fail; for example SMS forums for trainee primary teachers in Kenya (Traxler 2007b).
This classification is not purely theoretical or academic; it attempts to define mobile learning by organizing experiences with mobile learning to date. In relation to podcasting this classification has two roles. First, we can look at podcasting pilots and trials like those in this book and ask if they too map onto this classification and thus help us to understand podcasting. Second, we can ask whether mapping these podcasting trials and pilots onto the classification points to untried podcasting opportunities. Have we thought of trying podcasting in rural settings or large-scale podcasting, for example? |
