For Class Discussion (to prepare in advance):
Mobile and virtual learning will continuously grow expanding the horizon of promises, innovations, revolutions, and challenges. Distinction between mobile and virtual learning can be subtle, and video/online games and virtual worlds also make clear understanding difficult. Despite challenges, adoption and use of web connected mobile phones and devices will grow, and their daily use for everything including web access and collaboration will expand. Mobile and virtual learning try to leverage location based learning, ubiquitous learning, and authentic simulations.
Mobile and virtual learning will continuously grow expanding the horizon of promises, innovations, revolutions, and challenges. Distinction between mobile and virtual learning can be subtle, and video/online games and virtual worlds also make clear understanding difficult. Despite challenges, adoption and use of web connected mobile phones and devices will grow, and their daily use for everything including web access and collaboration will expand. Mobile and virtual learning try to leverage location based learning, ubiquitous learning, and authentic simulations.
- Mobile Learning Environments by David J. Gagnon
- Educause's 7 Things You Should Know About Mobile App
- Educause's 7 Things You Should Know About Android
- The Official Google Blog: The Future of Mobile by Steve Kolowich
- Educause’s 7 Things You Should Know About Virtual Worlds
- Video Games and the Future of Learning by Kurt Squire
- Sharing: The Moral Imperative by Dean Shareski (26 minute video)
- Questioning the Future of the Open Student by Vicki Davis
- Free as in Freedom: The Power of Pull – John Seely Brown by Sumeet Moghe
- The Mobile Campus (#2 and 3 illustrates the current practices, challenges, and needs of proper research)
- Educause: From
Distraction to Engagement: Wireless Devices in the Classroom
- From Toy to Tool: Cell Phones in Learning a blog by Liz Kolb. Please explore her site. It includes a lot of videos about innovative uses of cell phones and web tools.
- Educating the Net Generation, Chapter 12, Learning Spaces
- Educating the Net Generation, Chapter 15, Planning for Neomillennial Learning Styles: Implications for Investments in Technology and Faculty (You can choose either the pdf or html version (with diigo highlights) of Chapter 15)
- “Living Epic”: What the title means and what it implies by Roger Travis. Be sure to read parts 1-3 (the links appear at the end of posts 1 and 2)
- My Personal Learning Network in Action by Karl Fisch
- Cell Phones in the (Language) Classroom: Recasting the Debate by Peyton Jobe
- Social Media in Africa, Part 1
- Social Media in Africa, Part 2: Mobile Innovations
- Social Media in Africa, Part 3: Democracy. Want to know more about the impact of mobiles in the developing world? Check out this 38 minute presentation by Nathan Eagle of MIT (not required), “Crowd-Sourcing on Mobile Phones in the Developing World“
Popular Tools - Course Google Site at https://sites.google.com/site/idt351class/
- PhoneGap - Open source mobile framework for developing/downloading apps
- Portable Applications (Many applications are search-able by topics and categories)
- Second Life, OpenSim
- Scratch - Easy to use remixing tool from MIT (video 1 min)
- Game development: Unity, GameSalad, Sharendipity, Alice (3D programming)
- National Library of Virtual Manipulatives
- Siri - Virtual assistant
- Foursquare - Others can check where you are and where they have been, info around you
- ClassSpot and TeamSpot from TideBreak.Inc
You can comment on any of the following:
- Which tool was your favorite? How did the tool compare to others introduced in this week? If you plan to adopt the tool, for what purposes will you use it and how often? If you don't plan to use, why not?
- Do you think a school or workplace must actively use tools introduced in this week? Anything to consider in adoption or implementation at school or work?
- Or your reflection on anything related to the course (material, assignment, clarity, usefulness, suggestion, reaction to others, etc.)
20 comments:
In my experience at Western Illinois University, I have created some stimulation games using Scratch and Unity in my past course as a IDT major. I enjoyed all of the gaming software that I used but the only problem that I have had were coding; which was my first time at coding. Scratch was really fun to use because its basically already encoded for you and it's done with it's own specific coding. Unity on the other hand was all handing coding. Unity is basically all about hand coding and organizing. The difference between Scratch and Unity, they both have their own sense of coding and Scratch is more for younger kids 6 and up; while Unity is more for older kids that are interested in creating 3D virtual game.
Out of all these tools, I only recognize Second Life and the mobile applications. Since I have never been much of a gamer, the games and simulation tools are alien to me. However, I hope to work with them in the future. I think gaming has a great potential to engage students. I remember playing "Carmen Sandiego" as a child, among other computer games, and I can still recall knowledge acquired from those games. It made learning interesting and enjoyable. Additionally, computer games encouraged interaction with a digital interface. By restricting computer use in K-12 classrooms, students are missing something, which could efficiently enhance their education. Web-based educational games do exist—teachers simply need to scout them out and determine their educational worthiness.
I would say that second life would be one of my favorite tools for it has so many different applications and it has tools built into it. I looked at scratch and unity and they looked like they could be interesting and I will look into them more in depth in the future. I know I will look into using Alice for the programming interests me. It is the same with the second life the programming involved seems like it could have a lot of potential.I do not have any of the fancy devices needed to currently take an interest in mobile. However I still see what use they can be. I do think it could be beneficial for schools and work places to use some of the tools. However as with anything it would have to be monitored and controlled so it does not become an addiction or another problem.
In consideration of the tools we covered this week, I think they would make a great tool for teachers to create for younger students and have them learn from the contents of the games. Second life would be a good tool for middle school students and higher to use because they can explore areas that we can normally go to without having to take a expensive field trip. Student can visit the Smithsonian Museum without leaving the classroom. Universities can create virtual classroom and the students can answer questions and hold conversations in the virtual world. On the downside, students may not pay attention to the lessons and concentrate their attention on other social portions of the virtual world. Instructors would have to also consider privacy issues and have students and parents sign an agreement for to protect the student’s best interests.
Mobile devices are a new way institutions are implementing learning in schools. Students can access the school websites and courses through mobile devices. Instructors can create apps for the students to download for the course with compatible devices. One problem I could see would be for using mobile phones in the class. Some classes could decide to implement a phone poll for the class. Not every student will have access to a mobile device or have the phone service to take part in a class poll. Other programs that could be implemented could suffer due to lack of application compatibility.
Game development tools are a great way to get students to explore creating games and playing game for educational purposes. Students can learn addition and subtraction by creating games that teach basic arithmetic. One problem I can foresee is the learning curves some of these programs have and how it can be a problem with some student using and learning them. Teachers may also not be able to teach them because it may be to time consuming to teach the tool to students.
I enjoyed looking at the tools and I can see the learning potential for classes however, it will have to be up to the instructor to decide how the students can use each tool and if the students can easily pick up on how to use them.
I have never used any of these tools before, but feel that second life is by far one of the most interesting that we learned about this week. I knew from taking IDT 200 that Second Life has definite benefits in the business world and educational as well. On our Google course site, we as a group were able to see all the potential benefits that this program have. We posted a video of a medical procedure being done in a virtual world before it was practiced in a real life scenario. This would help to eliminate the possibility of an error when it came down to actually diagnosing someone with a sickness. We also posted a video in which someone was teaching four or five different people, who were involved in Second Life as well, how to do a math problem. This is without a doubt a great tool that can be utilized for distance learning. I feel that there are definite benefits that program possesses and I feel that if it was integrated into an educational or business setting it would be beneficial.
I have never used any of the tools before and do not know if I ever will or not. I think they all have benefits for different things and I think that is neat that companies use second life for things at work. I also think there are neat things that can be done with second life for training and things of that nature. I think the applications for creating apps for phones is a good one to get familiar with because right now that is a big market. I don, believe that market is going to get any smaller and as time goes on there will be fewer and fewer people without them in their pocket. With that being said being able do create apps for these devices will make yourself very marketable.
The only tools I had any experience with going into this week were Second Life and Foursquare. I had used Second Life prior to taking any IDT courses but I never really got into it. Same thing with Foursquare. I haven't had the enough time to check out the game development tools very thoroughly but plan on it in the future. I definitely think that they will have an impact on education. After researching Siri I think that could really revolutionize the way we interact with technology. If Siri ever works the way its developers say that it will, then eventually we should be having some sort of conversations with our computers. Earlier in the semester we talked about how we shape the web through our use of web 2.0 tools and Siri is exactly that; an artificial intelligence that learns the likes/dislikes, preferences and habits of its user to allow for the user to better interact with the web. I didn't see any evidence of these abilities in the videos I watched but supposedly the technology is there. Even if the full realization of technology like Siri is still a ways in the future then smartphones are on the verge of actually becoming smart.
Great postings class. Chris' message captured the future very well. Whether virtual worlds, mobile apps, or gaming, many see these areas as true illustration of what future education, learning, and web use would become. Nicole's post captures what teachers should consider very well. Equity is something that can not be ignored in any mass or instructional implementation.
Previous classes I have taken at Western Illinois University have included both of the GameSalad classes. With this prior knowledge I was happy with the choice of my group with the Alice project. I always learning new projects and instructional materials that are closely related to my interests. The Alice Project allows a easy transition into the world of game programming as opposed to the drag and drop style of interaction that is present in the GameSalad interface. It is the next logical step in learning how to create instruction based on games. To use an analogy GameSalad is the crawl phase, where as Alice is the walk phase. While GameSalad is two dimensional, Alice is three dimensional, so there would not be as many issues as young users saying "The graphics suck" While there may be some users that say that, I think once those users actually get into using the program it will hold their interest very well. This tool could be used in "gamification" of a current learning module or just about anything, the only limits are the creativity of the creator.
The tool that my group and I used this week was GameSalad, and this was chosen for the virtual portion of this week. GameSalad is similar to Alice and Unity being that it is a game creation program, and I would say it is my favorite because I haven’t gotten a chance to work with the other two. I have, however, worked with GameSalad already and will do so next semester as well. From what I gathered from Kenny’s post, Alice has 3-D game capabilities, but shares the same drag and drop interface as GameSalad. I think that Unity is a great program, but it requires a little bit of scripting knowledge, where as GameSalad is geared towards non-programmers. As I said, I plan to adopt the tool in my class next semester, however I also hope to play with it a little more because I love video games and have always wanted to create them. I sometimes fear I lack the creativity and artistic skills to create such things, but I believe with enough time and practice I could accomplish great things with that. If I ever were to be a hired based on the fact that I know the tool, then I would use it to whatever benefits the company best, and that could range from training to entertainment. I don’t know how often I will be using it, but it will probably be multiple days out of the week for at least an hour or so. It all depends where the future takes me, I suppose.
My group introduce the tool Nearpod this week. This is a great tool for teacher with a one-to-one technology in the classroom. My friend who is become a teacher showed me this tool and I think it is a great tool for teachers to use in a classroom that has tablets or computers for each student. It is a great tool to keep the students more on task. This is a different tool than any of the other tools used in this weeks topic. If I were a teacher, I would adopt this tool often. I think a school with technology for each student should integrate this into their teaching. It is a great tool to use. A couple thing to consider when integrating the tool is the cost for the school, the time it would take to make the presentations and quizzes, and the age of the children. If they are too young will they know how to go through the program. I have used Gamesalad before in a class twice and I think it is a pretty good tool. Once you know how to use it, you can make simple games with ease. I have an iPhone so I have Siri but I personally think that I am better of doing the things myself because Siri tends not to understand you.
My favorite tool would be Unity3d. Unity is a powerful 3d and 2d game engine. If you know how to code then unity can be a very useful to create instructional games with, if you have the time. I do plan to use unity to create games whether it’s for work or as a hobby. I think that schools and workplaces should use the tools that were introduced this week. Second Life could help with collaboration with school projects and with helping teachers with subjects like chemistry. Unity could help workplaces like a training environment by having a model that they would have to drag the parts to the right place and use the right tools to put an item together. GameSalad could be used to create a math game or a matching letters game for younger kids to give them entertainment and education at the same time.
i think game development tools are great for creating instructional materials. Using games for learning would get students attention because most students easily engaged to game activities. For this week, we introduced Alice. Alice's animations are created in a visual environment where users drag and drop graphical tiles to create instructions in a program, which correspond to standard statements in programming languages such as Java, C++, and C#. From Alice, students can see how animation programs run, they can understand the relationship between the behavior of the objects created in their animation and the programming statements they created.
The tool that I liked the most and that my group choose to work with was Gamesalad. What I like about the tool is you can create a game and make it pretty much whatever you want it to be. The difficult part is figuring out all of the attributes, getting them to work right and figuring out all of the calculations for each individual one. I feel like it could be a good tool but I would not use it unless you know how do use it very well. I have tried using it in the past and did not understand it very well.
The tool that my group chose to work this week was Alice. Alice is a free advanced 3D programming environment that make it easy to create an animation to tell a story, playing an interactive game, or a video to share on the web. Alice is similar to GameSalad and Unity 3D. This semester I am taking a class which uses GameSalad and I think that GameSalad is my favorite tool for this week's topic, because that is with the one that I have spent the most time and I am familiar with it, even though Alice seems interesting to learn more about it.
This week our group looked at Nearpod. It's a neat tool for presentations, because it matches the pace of the instructor to the student's devices. I think that's really important when the instructor wants to punch up their presentation with multimedia, but also wants to keep the attention of the students. One of the problems with adding technology to a presentation is that the audience can get distracted from the message. Something I'd like to see in this vein is something that prevents users from accessing other websites and distractions during a presentation. I feel it's really tempting to check out social media or some other internet distraction while the instructor is trying to give a presentation. If you can take away the temptation, then the presenter has the audience's attention.
This week my group focused on Nearpod. This tool is used for presentations and other activities in the classroom. Teachers can create a slideshow or powerpoint and share via this tool on tablets or laptops or other appropriate technology tools used in the classroom. This is meant for easier learning for students as they try and process new materials. The goal is not for students to get distracted using this tool so it is important for teachers to keep their students involved. Implementing this tool in the classroom more would be very beneficial for students in the grade school level or above because this tool makes things easier for teachers and students when new material is being introduced.
It is interesting to see how all see gaming tools as useful for leaner motivation and attention. Some posts focus on tools - relating to how it benefits learner experiences or motivation, collaboration would have been stronger, and many did that. Gamification is an important term that is gaining more attention for its appeal to learners and learning impact. You guys will be in a good position if you develop an expertise in a tool or two gaming software, and Gamesalad, Unity, or Alice are all good choices.
My group focused on GameSalad. I've used GameSalad before in class, and it was a good tool that has its pros and cons. One pro is that it has been used to make a few smartphone games, notably Flappy birds. The cons of GameSalad primarily is that during our use of it in class, it had a bad habit of crashing at the worst time. If you hadn't saved your progress, you'd have to start over from the beginning. The other issue is that the Mac version is far better than the Windows version. If someone didn't use Macs often, then they'd have to reach a compromise to use GameSalad because the Windows version is a mere shadow of the Mac version.
Is mobile learning done with compulsory subjects?
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