DevLearn2011 I’ll Take My Rapid eLearning to Go
One of the buzz words at DevLearn 2011 was ‘mLearning’ (mobile learning). Clearly there is a demand for people to be able to learn ‘on the go’. Accessing course content on smart phones, iPads and other mobile devices is appealing for a whole range of reasons. We all know the reasons, but what does it mean for us as eLearning developers?
Tom Kuhlmann, who runs the Articulate community, looked at some of the key issues for mLearning implementation at his DevLearn session ‘I’ll take my rapid eLearning to go’. The main point he made was that converting your existing eLearning courses into effective mLearning is not as hard as you think. In fact you may already have the tools to build mLearning. This is good news for eLearning developers, especially those working within tight budgetary and time constraints.
In the session Tom looked at some simple and cost-effective ways to take existing content and make it work on mobile devices. Here are his ideas for working with the tools you already have:
- Use email to send out scenarios to learners. They read the scenario, make a decision and then share what they think.
- Output your Powerpoint presentation as a video. Use Handbrake to convert to video (save slides as .WMV)
- Output your Powerpoint presentation as an image. Save the slides as a .png and import to photo gallery.
- Use the Picture Link iPad application. This enables you to hold interactive slideshows with images and videos on iPads.
- Save your Powerpoint slides as a PDF. Then learners can use Good Reader app.
- Watch out for new technology in the rapid eLearning field. For example Articulate’s soon-to-be-released Storyline can be used on iPads.
- Create a media channel. Use screenr and YouTube.
Tom also talked about some important considerations for mLearning. I found this part of the session the most interesting because it seems we are only just starting to think through the implications of mLearning. Here are some of the issues he raised for anyone venturing into mLearning development.
- How much information can learners digest on a smaller screen? Even more than eLearning, mLearning requires course content to be broken down into bite-sized chunks.
- How comfortable is mLearning? In other words, we need to think about the learner’s posture and how long they can sit and learn with a mobile device.
- What security issues need to be considered? For example, what would happen if the learner lost the device?
- Is mLearning suitable for only point of contact information? For example if learners need to find particular information while on the job, they can access reference materials easily. This type of learning is more like performance support than formalised learning.
‘I’ll take my rapid eLearning to go’ was a thought provoking session. On the one hand, it was encouraging to realise that you don't need to reinvent the wheel to deliver what you already have for mobile. On the other hand, Tom raised a few issues to do with mLearning that perhaps some of us hadn’t considered before.
The next few years will be very interesting as we witness—and also perhaps take part in—the evolution of mLearning. Watch this space!