Pedagogical Applications of Smartphone Integration in Teaching - Lecturers', Students' &amp; Pupils' Perspectives
Author: Seifert, Tami
Date: 2014-00-00
Type: Speeches/Meeting Papers
Subjects: Handheld Devices,Telecommunications,Technology Integration,Middle School Students,College Faculty,Student Motivation,Student Attitudes,Teacher Attitudes,Mixed Methods Research,Questionnaires,Interviews,Electronic Learning,Foreign Countries,Graduate Students,Grade 8,Grade 7

As the disparity between educational standards and reality outside educational institutions is increasing, alternative learning infrastructure such as mobile technologies are becoming more common, and are challenging long held, traditional modes of teaching. Educators' attitudes toward wireless devices are mixed. Wireless devices are perceived by some teachers as a distraction to the educational process while others report the benefits of wireless devices to the learning process. Incorporating mobile technology in teaching can provide a chance for educators to lead innovative pedagogy. This study was based on an experiment with middle school students, college students and college instructors. The aim of this study was to examine the extent to which the use of smartphones for teaching affects students' motivation. Moreover, it explored students' and instructors' attitudes toward the implementation of smartphones in education: the types of usage they implement and suggest and whether they think that smartphones should be implemented in academia as well as in schools at all. The study was conducted by a qualitative and quantitative analysis. Relevant information was collected based on the questionnaires, correspondence as well as personal journals and interviews. There was a difference in the difficulties various groups face. While the middle school students almost did not experience technical problems, the college students and their instructors needed much more technical assistance during the activities. Middle school 7th grade school students were highly motivated, demonstrated a high level of self-efficacy, found the activities interesting, learned new things and felt that they benefited from the collaborative work. Students expressed willingness to conduct such activities in the future; they said they would recommend such activities to their friends and would be excited to develop an activity of their own. College students were skeptical regarding the implementation of smartphones in education. Although they could think of various applications of location-based lesson plans, there was no significant difference between the pre-test and the posttest regarding the extent to which they intend to incorporate smartphones in their teaching at school. There was also no significant difference in the extent to which they thought that school teachers should implement smartphones in their lessons and in the extent to which college lecturers should implement smartphones in their lessons. College instructors were surprised to get acquainted with the &quot;wonders&quot; of technology. They considered the AR as &quot;Hallucinatory&quot; and could appraise the potential of the tool, but felt the need for more training prior to the implementation. They were practical and used the workshop in order to plan projects in the various disciplines that would benefit from the advantages mobile technologies offer. College students and instructors mentioned the concern that not every student owns a smartphone, and were concerned that students will access improper content on school time. There is a gap between school students, college students and college instructors in the ease and the extent they use mobile applications. In the transition period it would be useful to act side by side so that teachers can use innovative technologies for the benefit of their students' experience of best practices. [For the complete proceedings, see ED557171.]