Mobile learning for literacy, teacher training and curriculum development

Autor: Clementina Acedo
Rok vydání: 2014
Předmět:
Zdroj: PROSPECTS. 44:1-4
ISSN: 1573-9090
0033-1538
DOI: 10.1007/s11125-014-9299-9
Popis: While the field of mobile learning is not new, in recent years it has received vastly increased attention, both from seasoned researchers and practitioners in the field, and from new entrants. The new players include those who have been involved in traditional education and are now turning their attention to the promise of mobile learning, companies interested in its commercial potential, and agencies now seeing mobiles as a perfect medium to deliver their humanitarian missions. The new players may not have either the interests or the subject-matter expertise of those who have been involved in mobile learning for many years. As a result, there is some concern around the level of discussions and claims being made in the name of mobile learning. Is everything being said about mobile learning in fact true? Are all the initiatives that claim to offer mobile learning actually delivering on that promise? Has the spotlight on mobile learning helped to deepen the discussion and maturity of the field, or has it created hype that overpromises and underdelivers? Behind these questions are fluid and contending views and definitions of mobile learning. There are definitions based on pilots, programmes, and interventions within the education system that enhance, extend and reform the system, ones driven by the rhetoric and funding of innovation; at the other extreme, there are definitions based on new ways of producing, transforming, sharing, discussing ideas, images, information and opinions in the real world, challenging the relevance, credibility and authenticity of the education system. These definitions also challenge the modalities and priorities of UNESCO, working as it does with the institutions of government and the education systems of member states. The pressure for change in education moves from the top-down to the outside-in, and these views and definitions have profound implications for the sustainability and scale of those changes, as well as for the policies and practices related, for instance, to literacy, teacher training and curriculum development. The present special issue deals precisely with these important problems and uncertainties, while showing how they play out in different contexts and countries. The guest
Databáze: OpenAIRE
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