Mobile Education - A Glance at the Future: 2 Theoretical foundation for mobile education

2 Theoretical foundation for mobile education

"Curiosity will conquer fear even more than bravery will."
- James Stephens, Poet and Author

This section looks at related technologies, work, and theories that we use to support our assumptions on mobile education.

2.1 Technological background
There are some prerequisites that probably need to be in place for mLearning to occur and be of interest. One - is in our opinion - dependent on co-working technologies that we will discuss in the subsections below.

The cost of buying a mobile device suitable for mLearning and the price of the mobile courses will also influence the spread of mLearning. What will lead to a level of cost that is acceptable for people in general?

Politics is a central issue because the politicians can influence the extent to which broadband mobile technologies will be available to the general public. Politics also influences the cost of wireless technologies as they pass laws that regulate the operation of telecommunication companies.

The mobile networks in Europe today do not provide enough bandwidth to support the broad range of services that could be part of future mLearning, such as live videoconferencing and transmission of high quality graphics. Therefore the providers of mobile networks and mobile devices have to continue developing wireless broadband services. We believe that mLearning is totally dependent of the success of the new generation mobile networks and mobile devices that will infiltrate the market in the future.

For mLearning to become a success there has to be a wide variety of courses to choose from. One of the strengths regarding eLearning is that the institutions offer a large magnitude of courses and subjects. With mLearning the students can choose what and when to study. This promotes flexibility and offers universal educational opportunities to the general public.

2.1.1 Internet connectivity
The Internet had a modest start in 1969 in the US military where four computers exchanged information between one another. The original purpose of this network (ARPANET – Advanced Research Project Agency NETwork) was to develop a military research network that could survive a nuclear strike. It got popular in the universities where its use grew and gained a strong foothold. Today there are millions of computers connected to the Internet as shown in Figure 2 1 below.

Computers connected to the Internet in millions
Figure 2 1 Development of worldwide Internet users
(Source: Norsk Gallup/ Jupiter Communications, August 2002)

Web pages presented on the Internet are no longer static and text based. The Internet has become more dynamic and interactive, offering the possibility to include multimedia and advanced scripting capabilities. These are some of the enhancements that increase learning possibilities via the Internet.

2.1.2 Global system for mobile communications (GSM)
The most widely used protocol is currently GSM. There are some variations on the GSM protocol as well. GSM 900 and 1800 are used in Europe while GSM 1900 is used in the USA. By combining protocols in dual-band mobile telephones (GSM 900 + 1800), or tri-band where the GSM 1900 is also included, one may travel extensively and use the same mobile phone for calls, Internet access and mobile telephony services. The slow data transfer rates offered by GSM (9.6 Kbps) does not warrant its use for mLearning. However, the technology offers a viable migration path for faster wireless standards that are better suited to the needs of the mobile learner.

2.1.3 Universal mobile telecommunications system (UMTS)
UMTS is the third generation (3G) mobile communication system that is developed in Europe. It offers support for a wide range of voice, data and multimedia services. This technology is capable of data transfer speeds of up to 2 Mbps (Topland, 2002). However, attaining these high speeds will come at a cost. If a mobile technology like UMTS is well adapted in the market and gets enough users the price may be reduced in the same manner as, for instance, the GSM technology. This has important implications for its adaptation for purposes of mobile education. On the one hand, it will encourage the development of educational content with a rich feature set such as streaming video. On the other hand, high data transfer speeds will be associated with high costs, which will hamper its early adaptation. Milroy (2001) predicts that what we might witness is the development of both consumer and wireless data solutions that may not even require 3G but use the existent 2.5G infrastructures.

2.1.4 General packet radio service (GPRS)
GPRS is an “always-on” technology that allows users to be connected to the network at all times and gets updates on new information when it is published. A student might use GPRS technology to receive a notification when her teacher is on-line and available for questions. Only traffic generated by the user is billed. The transfer rate is between 30 and 100 Kbps. This is of utmost importance when transferring large chunks of data such as graphical presentations. GPRS is a very important technology in the development of third generation mobile networks. The unsolved problem is pricing: How much is it worth and how much should the service providers charge? A report by JPMorgan shows differences in pricing in Europe from about 1.5 to 10 € (approx. $ 1.4 to 9.5) per megabyte (Bones, 2002). Andersen Management reports prices of up to 32.5 € (approx. $31) per megabyte, in addition to the service provider’s start up fees (ibid.).

2.1.5 High speed circuit switched data (HSCSD)
HSCSD is an addition to the other services in the Global System for Mobile Communications (GSM) network that improves the transfer rate up to four times. The data transfer rate is up to 57.6 Kbit/s thus enableing internet access like standard dial-up modem services across fixed line networks (Mobile / Cellular Technology, 2002). Here you pay for airtime, not the amount of data transferred, which means that if you transfer an assignment you pay for the time it takes to transfer, not the amount transferred, as is the case with GPRS. A good way of using this technology is accessing or downloading learning material from the Internet before reading it off-line at one’s leisure.

2.1.6 Short messaging system (SMS)
The ability to send limited amounts of text (160 Latin characters, 70 Arabic or Chinese) from one mobile phone to another is called Short Messaging System (SMS). With respect to mLearning, it can be used to convey small amounts of important information, as illustrated in the Uniwap project conducted at the University of Helsinki where students received information via SMS messages (Kynäslahti, H., Seppälä, P., 2002). The disadvantage of using SMS is that it can be distracting, particularly when one might be tending to other issues. This is a service that could be also be used to send short messages to the students or teachers as well as an automated reply from a server to say that you may now see your grade on your last assignment.

2.1.7 Multimedia messaging system (MMS)
The use of multimedia on mobile phones is gaining ground at the moment with the introduction of Multimedia Messaging System (MMS) to send pictures from one mobile phone to another. It is an extended version of SMS. Pictures may improve students’ ability to recall actual situations as demonstrated inthe UNIWAp project (Kynäslahti, H., Seppälä, P., 2002).

2.1.8 Wireless application protocol (WAP)
WAP is a protocol used to view Wireless Markup Language (WML) based pages that reside on a server. Nokia’s website provides the following definition:

“Wireless Application Protocol (WAP) is the first global standard for Internet services over mobile phone networks. It is capable of displaying "mini websites", which look simple when compared with normal websites but which already provide a variety of powerful services, including banking, ticket purchase, news updates and more.” (Nokia Corporation, 2002).

The WAP protocol is thus ideal for developing applications for mobile networks with low bandwidth, and user interface limitations (Landers, 2002).

Our prediction is that there will be a few major standard formats for data presentation, storage and transfer. WAP was meant as such a standard, but has not been a success due to poor usability.

“Following a UK field study, 70% of users decided not to continue using WAP. Currently, its services are poorly designed, have insufficient task analysis, and abuse existing non-mobile design guidelines. WAP's killer app is killing time; m-commerce's prospects are dim for the next several years” (Nielsen, 2000b).

Probably service providers will make their products work with the most common mobile units available. It seems that to us that new mobile units will come first, and then the services will follow.

2.1.9 Mobile phones and personal digital assistants (PDA)
Today’s mobile devices do not have a large storage capacity. You can store phonebook entries, short notes and download new ring tones and now multimedia messages. We believe that mLearning will include text, graphics, sound and even movies and probably a combination of the above mentioned. Maybe the mobile devices will be able to read and use memory cards for other devices for example digicams and portable music-players. Memory cards are constantly getting more storage capacity and are sold at lower prices. Our assumption is that the mobile industry will continue aim at converging existing and new technologies onto a single device.

Mobile phones
The first mobile phones were developed in the late 80s. These were bulky devices and offered a limited range of services. Mobile phones produced in the 90s were smaller and lighter. This resulted in a new wave of public interest. With a mobile phone, one could be reachable independent of time and place.

Today one can send SMS, e-mail, music, sound and pictures, including the added capability of connecting to the Internet. This technology is still new, and offers several avenues for technological advancement.

Data transmission speed is a bottleneck when mobile phones are used on the Internet. There is a lot of work being put into resolving this issue, and it is hoped that 3G technologies will be the answer. Asian countries have worked on developing 3G technologies, and have reached greater heights in this regard, compared to their European counterparts (Søiland, 2002).

Great technological advances have been made in the field of mobile telephony over the past years. This has resulted in increased functionality on smaller units. In the future, we will see mobile phones being used in a wide array of products and services; for instance drivers’ licenses, identification cards, and the like. All this functionality will be integrated in a single mobile unit (Selnes, Mobilnyheter.com, 2001).

With regards to mLearning there are still some things that need to be improved. Usability features of mobile devices, such as small screen size; high data transfer costs and bandwidth limitations are some drawbacks to the use of mobile phones as an mLearning tool. Usability limitations are constantly being addressed. Current trends in PDA, hybrid phones and smart phone technology, bear witness of the changing times.

Personal digital assistants (PDA)
PDAs are hand-held computers that were originally used as personal organizers. The basic PDA functions are: A calendar, address book, task list and notebook. In recent times, the synchronization of data between desktop / laptops and PDAs has improved. This allows one to transfers larger chunks of data.

Today PDAs are available with color screens, relatively large amounts of RAM, built-in modem, speakers, and expansion slots. Like personal computers, PDAs run on an operating system. The dominant operating systems are PocketPC and Palm OS.

The shift towards wireless technology on PDAs is of interest to the report we will be working on. Network cards for wireless networks are now available for use on PDAs to enable access to existing networks and the Internet. Newer models have wireless networking (WLAN) as standard. A variety of hardware vendors are also embedding Bluetooth chips into their products, and new solutions that provide faster data transfer speeds will most likely be available in the near future.

Bluetooth will simplify interconnecting wireless devices of many types within a limited area (also referred to as the Personal Area Network - PAN). The technology allows one to be automatically connected to the Internet / intranet and other computer peripherals as soon as one within range of a Bluetooth hub that is typically connected to a personal computer. Data stored on the PDA can then be synchronized with a computer if desired. Data transfer speeds of 58Kbps to 720Kbps (Thurrot, 2002) make it a promising wireless communications technology.

When on the road, one can connect to the Internet using a PDA connected to a mobile phone on the GSM network or via GPRS. Thus one gets the feeling of high mobility, and minimal effort is required to connect the PDA to other peripherals (Leong, 2001).

Summary
mLearning has to be a comfortable and practical way of studying. The ordinary mobile units today are equipped with a small screen with rather poor quality. The next generation units provide true color, great resolution and can present crisp clear color images and movies as the more advanced models do today. These units also come with speakers and can play music in compact disk quality or even better. For mLearning students this means the opportunity of a great audiovisual learning experience.

The problem today is that these multimedia units are rather expensive and only limited amounts of supporting services are available. We believe that in a few years the situation will be quite the opposite. Mobile multimedia units at reasonable prices will probably dominate the market, not the ordinary GSM-phones. There will be a broad range of services available for the users: Hopefully also educational services.

Battery capacity is a critical factor for any mobile device. There is no use offering mLearning courses if batteries run out after a short duration. Today mobile devices do have quite good battery capacity, but it is still not common to stream live video/music and display high-resolution graphics, which drains much more power than playing simple games on a GSM-phone.

Mobile units suitable for mLearning have to be equipped with a wireless communication device of some sort. Bluetooth, GSM and similar technologies use radio waves to transfer data without the need of a physical link between the units that are communicating. A concern is the extent to which users of mobile units are exposed to dangerous radiation. Research in the area does not unanimously indicate that the radiation from GSM- devices can lead to diseases like brain tumor and cancer. Thus research has proven that people using the old fashioned NMT- system have a higher chance of developing brain cancer (Neset, 2001).

2.1.10 Wireless networks
The trend seems to be towards the provision of faster and more secure wireless networks. This will have a profound effect on the nature in which course content for mobile learners is distributed. It also opens up for more interactive real-time student-student / teacher-student sessions. However, the dilemma we face is that higher speeds are also associated with higher costs, which in turn means that students at colleges will be less likely to adopt new technologies despite the inherent advantages they provide. Early adopters of new standards that provide higher speeds will most likely be corporations whose staff needs to be up in speed with state-of-the-art technologies in order to have a competitive edge over the firms’ competitors.

Overview
In 1997, the Institute of Electrical and Electronic Engineers (IEEE) published the 802.11 standard for wireless networks (Iwanski, 2001). This standard supports transmission in infrared light, Frequency Hopping Spread Spectrum (FHSS), and Direct Sequence Spread Spectrum (DSSS). In the 802.11 specification, DSSS supports speeds up to 2Mbps with a fallback of 1Mbps if the transmission is too noisy, and FHSS supports a speed of 1Mbps with the ability to transmit at 2Mbps if the transmission is exceptionally clean (Chernicoff, 2000).

The IEEE amended the original 802.11 standards in 1999 to embrace speeds of 5.5Mbps and 11Mbps, while still maintaining backward compatibility with the original 802.11 standard (Iwanski, 2001). The new standard was called 802.11b.

More recently, 802.11a products have emerged in the market place despite the fact that 802.11b is still the de facto standard for wireless communication (Otey, 2002). According to a publication released by Windows & .NET magazine, three more wireless standards are due to be released in 2003. These are:

802.11e that adds to the 802.11a and 802.11b standards a Quality of Service (QoS) layer for better performance for selected applications.
802.11f adds multi-vendor interoperability to 802.11 products.
802.11g that has 54Mbps speed and compatibility with the 802.11b standard.
(ibid.)

The trend seems to develop towards the provision of faster and more secure wireless networks. This will have a profound effect on the nature in which course content for mobile users is distributed. It also opens up for more interactive real-time student-student / teacher-student sessions. However, the dilemma we face is that higher speeds are also associated with higher costs, which in turn means that students at colleges will be less likely to adopt new technologies despite the inherent advantages they provide. Early adopters of new standards that provide higher speeds will most likely be corporations whose staff needs to be up in speed with state-of-the-art technologies in order to have a competitive advantage over the firms’ competitors.

2.2 Educational theory
This section looks at two educational theories and their application to mobile learning.

2.2.1 Bloom’s taxonomy
In 1956, a group of educational psychologists led by Dr. Benjamin Bloom, set out to develop a classification of levels of intellectual learning behavior. The classification consisted of three overlapping domains:

Cognitive domain, which is concerned with knowledge and the development of intellectual attitudes and skills;
Affective domain, which is concerned with emotion as well as values, and
Psychomotor domain, which is concerned with things that students might physically do. These are principally manual and physical skills. In other words learning through physical practice.
(Doyle, 2001).

Each of the domains in the taxonomy described above is further divided into sublevels. We have focused on the cognitive domain in this report. The cognitive domain has six educational objectives, which range from the simplest to most complex behavior:

Knowledge. At this level one is capable of recalling previously learnt material. It is the simplest of the six educational objectives;
Comprehension. This level measures one’s ability to understand and interpret material;
Application. Upon reaching this level, the learner should be capable of putting the knowledge gained into practice;
Analysis. The learner is capable of identifying constituent parts that make up the topic at this level;
Synthesis. This marks the level where the learner uses previously learnt ideas to create new one, and
Evaluation, which is the most complex level. The learner is capable of independent judgement on a subject matter presented before him or her. Based on his or her evaluation, they select the best course of action.
(ibid.).

The simpler behavior must be mastered in order to move to the next level. The six educational objectives can thus be presented in the form of a pyramid or hierarchy as shown in Figure 2 2 below. Knowledge is the foundation upon which all other levels build.

Figure 2 2 Bloom's taxonomy, Doyle 2001

The six levels presented above were created with the traditional classroom in mind. For mobile education to be useful, it should be capable of supporting at least one of these levels.

Topland (2002, p.14) identifies how mLearning may contribute to the learning process at each level in Bloom’s taxonomy. In higher education, particular attention has to be taken to develop the learner’s analysis, synthesis and evaluation of material. A student could thus, for instance, use the mobile device as a supplement to other study methods before selecting the best course of action for solving a given problem (level 6). Projects such as Knowmobile project (Lundby ed., 2002) provide real-life examples of the use of mobile devices during medical student internships at local hospitals in Norway. Although students in the project did not find it convenient to use the PDAs to solve all their medical tasks, it provided them with a quick and convenient way for just-in-time (level 3) access to information sources and an alternative channel for interacting with colleagues (ibid.).

In order to effectively support the different levels of Bloom's taxonomy, user friendly mobile devices and adequate underlying technologies (see section 2.1) have to be in place.

2.2.2 Online teaching system
Paulsen (2002) makes reference to Verner’s work in which three components that constitute the process of adult education are identified: methods – organizing people for learning, techniques – helping the participants to learn, and devices. He also cites Stubbs and Burnham’s model for an electronic distance education system in which electronic devices play a major role in facilitating teaching, learning and the dissemination of course content, where the tutor and student are separated by time and space (Paulsen, 2001). By applying this model to an online teaching system, Paulsen (ibid.) presents a new model that not only seeks to address the weaknesses in that presented by Stubbs and Burnham, but also focuses on the student (see Figure 2 3 below).

Figure 2 3 Model of an online teaching system, Paulsen (2002)

The main components in the model are the learner (or student), teacher, content, methods, techniques and devices. For online education to be effective there must be a perfect interplay between each of these elements. Like in any system, its effectiveness depends on limitations placed on it by the system environment (Paulsen, 2002).

We can draw parallels to mobile education based on the model above. Our focus in this section will be on the role of the actors and interpersonal relationships that exist between them, with mobile technologies as the medium for communication. We also look how mobile technologies affect how actors in mobile education work.

The teacher’s role in mobile education is a facilitator in the learning process. The main challenge is to provide pedagogical support to mobile students independent of time and location (Fageberg et al., 2002). To do so, changes in the way the teacher works are essential. Tight classroom schedules are non-existent and most educational content is readily available to the tutor on the mobile device or can be accessed using a wireless Internet connection (Sariola, Sampson, et. al, 2002). These possibilities allow for a great degree of flexibility and interactivity that is important in adult student education (Paulsen, 2002). Other studies indicate that the use of mobile devices in education facilitated communication with colleagues in addition to allowing them to search the web for resources (Shotsberger & Vetter, 2001). Shotsberger and Vetter (ibid.) note that when teachers interact synchronously while surfing the web for resources, they can plan lessons that incorporate web resources more effectively, while drawing from the experiences and insights of a large pool of teachers. These possibilities may contribute to a better quality of material that is presented to students as it allows the teacher to exchange views on different topics. It also gives the teacher a light tool to use for personal research and collaboration with students and peers when they are not within the confines of the educational institution.

The student’s role is that of an information seeker. To assist them in realizing this objective, wireless data solutions allow them to access a wide range of internal and external learning resources. The former encompasses educational materials that are copyright material produced by the school, while the latter refers to freely available (or in some cases may require a fee) web resources (Paulsen, 2001, p. 203). Exposure to the Internet “enhances the learning experience by increasing student-instructor and student-student interactions” (Shotsberger & Vetter, 2001). In addition, students can establish learning communities with individuals who share similar interests, but who are not students at the school. According to Sariola (2001), mLearning also offers students the opportunity to conveniently interact with researchers particularly in authentic research situations. mLearning may thus have a place as a useful tool in experiential learning. However, we think that its use as a tool in learning science subjects is limited, as one cannot have the same experience as that derived from physically working in a laboratory. Batista (2000) states that students equipped with mobile learning devices will spend less time in the library. With all study material readily available on mobile device, students no longer need to spend much of their time in the library looking for academic resources. This raises important issues with regards to student-computer ratio (Hansen, 2002). An increase in the number of those adapting mLearning will free more library resources, such as computers connected to the Internet, to other students or teachers. Other research indicates that when students use mobile devices as a learning tool, the response rate to the tutor’s questions is much higher than in a traditional classroom (Shotsberger & Vetter, 2001). Increased responses have a double effect: It enables reserved students to participate more actively in discussions (Paulsen, 2001, p.100) and it provides the tutor with better feedback on how well a given topic has been understood (Shotsberger & Vetter, op.cit.). In effect what this means is a higher quality of service for the student as the teacher can adapt his study methods to cater for the students who seem to have problems with certain areas of the syllabus. In summary, one can say that mLearning makes the student’s total learning experience very flexible.

We assume that students will study more often, but for shorter periods because it only takes seconds to get set up and ready for studying the mLearning way. Studying often and for shorter periods of time may give pedagogic advantages such as improved focus and better concentration on the subject. However, we are not certain that the student will memorize very effectively because studying this way can be very stressful.

The educational institutions might provide cheaper courses. The number of available courses will possibly increase because the institution does not have to provide facilities for the teaching to take place and the classes can include, in theory, an unlimited amount of students. The cost of engaging a teacher who does his work at home and gets paid per corrected/reviewed report or per answered enquiry is very cost efficient in that the costs are bound to the specific amount of students. This means that the institution may run a course with only ten students, because the cost is not a problem when the course already has been developed.

2.3 Design theory
In this section, we will focus on two interrelated aspects of design theory: Human-computer interface design and usability.

Human-computer interface design aims at creating an efficient way in which the user can interact with the computer. Developing good user interfaces requires that the designer take into account the kind of user(s) that will be interacting with the system (Skaalid, 1999). These range from beginners to experts. While beginners typically require guidance by way of help files or audio-visual simulations, experts are more concerned with getting their tasks accomplished in the least possible time (ibid.).

Usability is a measure of the user interface’s ease of use for both novice and expert (Mayhew, 1999). Thus human-computer interface design has a profound impact on usability. In a mobile education context, we have to take into consideration usability features of both course content and mobile devices. Taking usability issues seriously is an important step towards the adaptability of mLearning.

Course content is an important ingredient in online teaching. Several variables come into play in developing user-friendly interfaces for course content. Jacob Nielsen (2002), for instance, lists ten usability heuristics (see appendix L) that helps developers ascertain the ease of use of the websites they create. More importantly, he has emphasis on the need for better response time when viewing pages on the web. Nielsen (2000a, p. 42) recommends 10 seconds, as the maximum response time required to download a page since “that’s the limit of people’s ability to keep there attention focused while waiting”. He goes further to say that “speed must be the overriding criterion” when designing web pages (Nielsen, 1997). One way to so when developing course content designed for mobile learners is to reduce the use of graphics and multimedia (ibid.). Alternatively, one can turn to the properties inherent in the mobile devices and communication standards when connecting to the Internet, such as better processing power, high speed wireless internet connections, and the like.

Usability for a handset device is not limited to user interface design. It also encompasses “dynamic integration of product user interface and accessories, bearer technology, network and services” (Ketola & Röykkee, 2002, p. 2). Moreover, it needs to incorporate both device-to-device and device-to-service interoperability (ibid.). These factors must be taken into consideration when evaluating which devices are best suited for mobile learning. A number of mLearning studies and articles have addressed issues relating to user interface issues. Quinn (2000), for instance, states: “My preference would be something with about an 800 x 600 color screen, a pen, a foldout keyboard (when necessary), fully networked, with a microphone and a speaker. It might be 3 x 5 inches when the keyboard is not extended, and would have a slot to plug in additional capability (for example, a camera). It would either have an advanced browser or a dedicated learning application as one of the software packages”.

We find screen size to be of utmost importance as it is the main interface the user interacts with in an mLearning environment. Nielsen (2000a, p.356) indicates that a large screen gives the user with a better overview of web content than a smaller one. Designers thus have formidable task of coming up with a device that is neither too bulky - to be considered a computer, nor too small so that it makes it difficult for the student or teacher to work effectively.

To the Methodology and data collection