Innovation in Mobile Learning: A European Perspective

In the evolving landscape of mobile learning, European researchers have conducted significant mobile learning projects, representing a distinct perspective on mobile learning research and development. Our paper aims to explore how these projects have arisen, showing the driving forces of European innovation in mobile learning. We propose context as a central construct in mobile learning and examine theories of learning for the mobile world, based on physical, technological, conceptual, social and temporal mobility. We also examine the impacts of mobile learning research on educational practices and the implications for policy. Throughout, we identify lessons learnt from European experiences to date

A Revolving Door: Challenges and Solutions to Educating Mobile Students

The problem of students changing schools in the middle of the school year is not new. The consequences of these changes, however, are increasingly dire. Student mobility, defined as students' movement into and out of schools and school districts during a school year, is particularly prevalent among low-income, immigrant and minority children, whose families are often susceptible to changes in housing that precipitate changes in the schools they attend. In an era in which all students are held to high standards, the disruption caused by moving from school to school -- sometimes multiple times within one school year -- can have devastating results for mobile students as well as the teachers and non-mobile students in the schools from which these students depart and to which they arrive.The purpose of this report is to shed light on the challenges associated with high rates of student mobility in order to best identify and disseminate promising strategies for overcoming these challenges -- both inside and outside of schools. The report is intended to highlight the issue of student mobility and focus policymakers' attention on the changes needed in policy and practice at state and local levels to best serve these students. The ultimate goal is to ensure that mobile students are provided with every opportunity to receive the high quality education that will enable them to become successful, productive citizens.This report focuses on districts in Massachusetts' Gateway Cities; in these 11 school districts, 35,000 students moved at least once during the 2008 -- 09 school year, representing 35% of all mobile students statewide. In some of these districts, nearly one-third of the students changed schools during the course of the year. This report describes the scale of Massachusetts' student mobility problem and the challenges student mobility presents in 11 schools in 6 Gateway City districts (Brockton, Fitchburg, Haverhill, Holyoke, Springfield, and Worcester). Findings were gathered from interviews with 43 school and district staff members in the 6 Gateway Cities school districts listed above.The report also provides examples of promising school-, district- and state-level strategies for mitigating the negative impact of mobility. The final section puts forth considerations for action for Massachusetts policymakers. The report suggests that Massachusetts policymakers:develop the Readiness Passport and incorporate individual indicators of student mobility;expand current efforts to better understand the implications of student mobility and support the districts most impacted by it; develop a more flexible and responsive funding system; consider how to incorporate student mobility into the state accountability system while holding all students to high standards; encourage schools of education to incorporate training for working with mobile students; and promote interagency collaboration to address the root causes of student mobility. The report was the subject of discussion during a public event in Holyoke, MA on September 20, 2011

The genesis and development of mobile learning in Europe

In the past two decades, European researchers have conducted many significant mobile learning projects. The chapter explores how these projects have arisen and what each one has contributed, so as to show the driving forces and outcomes of European innovation in mobile learning. The authors identify context as a central construct in European researchers’ conceptualizations of mobile learning and examine theories of learning for the mobile world, based on physical, technological, conceptual, social and temporal mobility. The authors also examine the impacts of mobile learning research on educational practices and the implications for policy. Finally, they suggest future challenges for researchers, developers and policy makers in shaping the future of mobile learning

Mobile Learning Revolution: Implications for Language Pedagogy

Mobile technologies including cell phones and tablets are a pervasive feature of everyday life with potential impact on teaching and learning. “Mobile pedagogy” may seem like a contradiction in terms, since mobile learning often takes place physically beyond the teacher's reach, outside the walls of the classroom. While pedagogy implies careful planning, mobility exposes learners to the unexpected. A thoughtful pedagogical response to this reality involves new conceptualizations of what is to be learned and new activity designs. This approach recognizes that learners may act in more self-determined ways beyond the classroom walls, where online interactions and mobile encounters influence their target language communication needs and interests. The chapter sets out a range of opportunities for out-of-class mobile language learning that give learners an active role and promote communication. It then considers the implications of these developments for language content and curricula and the evolving roles and competences of teachers

Researching mobile learning: overview, September 2006 to September 2008

This is the summary of the report, which brought together the findings from the third phase of a two-year development and research project that focused on the impact of one-to-one personal ownership of mobile devices. Two areas emerged from the analysis as important in relation to impact, namely students' use of and attitudes to their mobile devices and the professional development of teachers

Student mobility: moving beyond deficit views

This paper discusses issues that relate to student mobility and implications for teachers and guidance officers. Whilst there has been a tendency to locate problems associated with mobility in the children themselves or in their families, it is argued that this is not a particularly productive approach. Taking lessons from recent literacy understandings and using data from a study about the children of itinerant fruit pickers, this paper takes a broader perspective, recommending that school personnel widen their focus to include an examination of school practices and to consider equity implications for mobile students

Using iPads as a learning tool in cross-curricular collaborative initial teacher education

Mobile technologies are becoming more and more prevalent in learning environments. This means that teacher education must keep pace with the use of mobile technologies. Baran (2014) argues that the ‘greatest added value of mobile learning vis-a-vis PC learning lies in the aspects that extend classroom interaction to other locations via communication networks’. (p. 18) This article outlines a pilot study developed to support collaborative working between the English and science pre-service teachers, in which mobile technologies were used to extend students interactions outside the classroom, using iPads in authentic, fieldwork situations

Fast parallel volume visualization on cuda technology

In the medical diagnosis and treatment planning, radiologists and surgeons rely heavily on the slices produced by medical imaging scanners. Unfortunately, most of these scanners can only produce two dimensional images because the machines that can produce three dimensional are very expensive. The two dimensional images from these devices are difficult to interpret because they only show cross-sectional views of the human structure. Consequently, such circumstances require highly qualified doctors to use their expertise in the interpretation of the possible location, size or shape of the abnormalities especially for large datasets of enormous amount of slices. Previously, the concept of reconstructing two dimensional images to three dimensional was introduced. However, such reconstruction model requires high performance computation, may either be time-consuming or costly. Furthermore, detecting the internal features of human anatomical structure, such as the imaging of the blood vessels, is still an open topic in the computer-aided diagnosis of disorders and pathologies. This study proposed, designed and implemented a visualization framework named SurLens with high performance computing using Compute Unified Device Architecture (CUDA), augmenting the widely proven ray casting technique in terms of superior qualities of images but with slow speed. Considering the rapid development of technology in the medical community, our framework is implemented on Microsoft .NET environment for easy interoperability with other emerging revolutionary tools. The Visualization System was evaluated with brain datasets from the department of Surgery, University of North Carolina, United States, containing 109 datasets of MRA, T1-FLASH, T2-Weighted, DTI and T1-MPRAGE. Significantly, at a reasonably cheaper cost, SurLens Visualization System achieves immediate reconstruction and obvious mappings of the internal features of the human brain, reliable enough for instantaneously locate possible blockages in the brain blood vessels without any prior segmentation of the datasets