Wireless and mobile computing:pedagogy and liberal education

NITLE workshop

April 2007

College of Wooster

Plan of the session

1. Hardware

2. Infrastructure

3. Case studies

4. Pedagogies emergent

http://www.phonebashing.com/, 2003(previous image: “Telezonia”)

One way of looking at it

All of Web 2.0, just more so• Ambient

• Accelerating

• Annotating

Funeral of John Paul, AP

I. Hardware

Wireless computing uses the radio spectrum, rather than telephone or ethernet cables, to send digital information. The name hearkens back to the earliest days of radio, and appropriately, since wireless computing is very much a young field.

I. Hardware

(Mandatory mobile device slide)

I. Hardware

(Yet another mandatory mobile device slide)

Long., MPH, ksmichel

I. Hardware

(Still another mandatory mobile device slide) Tnkgrl

I. Hardware

(How many mandatory mobile device slides can there be?)

Carl Berger, Wei Su

II. Infrastructure

• 802.11x and Wi-Fi (IEEE)

• Proprietary Cellular-Wireless Networks

• WiMax

II. Infrastructure

• PAN: Personal Area Networks

• Bluetooth: short-range wireless specification

• Infrared (IR) ports for beaming

(Found on BBC site, June 2005)

American unilateralism

III. Case studies

Pedagogies: new forms

John Schott, Carleton College, 2006

III. Cases

Handhelds in class: Stanford Medical classes, East Carolina University's Center for Wireless and Mobile Computing, medical school, OWLS, UM Duluth's handheld pilot, Western Carolina University - Wireless Palm (TLT report), Pittsburgh Pebbles Project; University of South Dakota.

III. Cases

Handhelds out of class• Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam and

Amsterdam Real Time: SPINlab's GIPSY project

• St. Olaf's Japanese language Clie pilot (http://www.stolaf.edu/depts/asian-studies/japanese/handheldarticle.html)

• Jokkmokk 2004 (HUMlab)

III. Cases

Handhelds and libraries: University of Connecticut Medical Library, Virginia Commonwealth Libraries, British libraries.

III. Cases

• Campus clouds: American University's wireless campus, Carnegie Mellon's Wireless Andrew, Dartmouth's wireless campus, Seton Hall University

(http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/10.10/dartmouth.html, http://www.wired.com/gadgets/wireless/news/2002/05/52234, http://www.cmu.edu/computing/wireless/)

III. Cases

Students researching• SUNY Cortland's nature research. • Tremont Consolidated's clam research with Palms

(http://www.wired.com/culture/education/news/2002/11/56102)

• Experience has shown that portable and wireless computing facilitates data collection, which has certain pedagogical implications. Students have greater facilities for gathering information from the field, thereby. Field researchers can be better integrated with classes (with each other, instructors, experts) through wireless communication:

III. Cases

• Cell phones: bioinformatics on the run (BioWAP and WiGiD); Russian Bible class (Pravda 2004-12, http://english.pravda.ru/main/18/90/363/11765_phone.html)

III. Cases

iPaqs, University of Minnesota Duluth, 2002

• uses in class: notetaking, .ppt slides, exercises, polling, reference

• uses outside of class: browsing, email, software– (http://www.d.umn.edu/itss/computing/

ipaq/)

IV. Pedagogies

Emergent pedagogies• Information on

demand• Time usage

changes• Class/world barrier

reduction

• Personal intimacy with units

• Spatial mapping • Mobile, multimedia,

social research

IV. Pedagogies

Students researching• Googling on

demand• Local digital

resources

• Queries to colleagues, experts, dbs, faculty, librarians

• Spatial mapping

IV. Pedagogies

Pedagogy: learning spaces

classroom • one leading pilot space for wireless• arrangements• mode: lecture/lab

campus• other sites: library, residence hall• new learning spaces• chunks of campus

IV. Pedagogies

Pedagogy: learning spaces

external world• increasingly reachable, present• world as syllabus, research field

annotated space• writing to removed units• writing to space, augmenting reality (classic:

Spohrer's "Information in Places")• spatial information: (34 North 118 West /, )

• Pedagogy: learning spaces, example

Volokh Conspiracy, April 2007

IV. Pedagogies emergent

Publishing• Synching MP3 player, Palm, PocketPC, etc.

user to copy materials from a desktop or laptop to their handhelds (AvantGo, Mazingo, PalmReader, Acrobat for Palm, Fictionwise (free ebooks), Microtitles, Peanut Press, SciFi.com, Writing on Your Palm)

• USB drives allow easy, person-to-person file trading. Their low price and good size makes them a publishing option.

IV. Pedagogies emergent

Publishing applications

• Palm Education offers more than one hundred educational applications. Nearspace has released several campus life applications. (http://www.nearspace.com/)

• One can roll one's own, as well. For example, UMDuluth wrote applications for its Pocket PC pilot.

• K-12 applications: Cooties, Geney

IV. Pedagogies emergent

Multitasking

• threats: distraction, wandering (NYT article abstract)

• index/stimulus (ECAR study, Slashdot discussion)

• generational issue

• practice: shells down, machines open

IV. Pedagogies emergent

Structural pressures

• IT: support, pedagogy

• Faculty: pedagogy, development, reward

• Students: class participation

• Library: information literacy, db access

• Administration: planning

IV. Pedagogies

Social changes• Swarming: John Arquilla,

David Ronfeldt Networks and Netwars: The Future of Terror, Crime, and Militancy (2001)

• Smartmobs (Howard Rheingold, 2001)