Multimedia & M-Learning

In the last week's presentations, I would like to applaud all of my colleagues for doing such great work. Their presentations were not only informative but they also effectively engaged me by developing an interest in the topic. Each presenter was confident, organized, spoke with passion, and clearly stated their part of the history of multimedia.

I learned a lot from their works. I found that the newspapers were perhaps the first mass communication medium to employ multimedia -- they used mostly text, graphics, and images. Looking at the advancements in technology, we can say that multimedia has come a long way from its humble roots to today's cutting-edge modern animation and interactivity.

Quite a few students discussed multiple learning theories discussed in the first half of the presentation. Here I would like to add my thoughts on a new concept worthy of being a new theory but has not found a notable place in the educational world.  It is called the "Entertainment-Education." University of Buffalo scholars, Drs. Wang and Hua (2009) stated entertainment-education as:

A theory-based communication process for purposefully embedding educational and social issues in the creation, production, processing, and dissemination process of an entertainment program, to achieve desired individual, community, institutional, and societal changes among the intended media user population. (p. 1)

The pioneer of this concept, Miguel Sabido, a Mexican TV producer, formalized the field. He initially called it "Entertainment with a proven social benefit" in the 1960s, which Everett Rogers re-branded as "Entertainment and Education" in 1979, and Patrick Coleman simplified as "Entertainment-Education," which is the presently used term. Entertainment-Education (EE) involves the process of purposively designing and implementing a media message through a means in which the audience is both entertained and educated, to increase audience members' knowledge about an educational issue, create favorable attitudes towards a problem, and change behavior (Singhal & Rogers, 1999). It is a communication strategy, not a theory of communication. Its general purpose is to contribute to the process of directed social change, which can occur at several levels (individual, community, society).

Here let me shed some thoughts on multimedia as a source of delivering knowledge in mobile learning.  M-learning is defined as learning methods and materials (Multimedia) that involve mobile phones or handheld computers. M-learning has gained attention over the last several years. Still, little work has been done to optimize content in distance education programs to take full advantage of this delivery medium.

As stated by Gedik, Hanci-Karademirci, Kursun, and Cagiltay (2012), in 2010, approximately 90% of the world population had available access to mobile networks, with 80% of people in rural areas having such connectivity.  The depth of mobile penetration has reached a tipping point, and now is the time to address learning via mobile devices.

There are clear benefits to M-learning. These benefits are access to content, increased interaction in distance education, and leveraging of preferred communication channels. Mobile technologies promote the active participation of learners in-between the activities of the distance learner's busy daily life.

Where there are opportunities to reach learners with the delivery method, there are also significant challenges. These challenges relate to issues such as inconsistency of mobile device user interfaces, feature diversity, and various existing platforms (android, iOS, Windows, etc.)  (Sarrab & Aldabbas, 2012).

Designing for the various devices, browsers, operating systems, and features presents challenges to M-learning designers.  Design principles presented by Wang & Shen (2012) identify four key elements necessary for effective  multimedia learning design for the various devices today.

Principle 1: Design for the least common denominator.

Principle 2: Design for eLearning, adapt for M-learning.

Principle 3: Design short and "condensed" materials for smartphones.

Principle 4: Be creative when designing for mobile devices with 3G and 4G technologies.

Students expect learning guides, exam help, and short video lessons never longer than 5 minutes to be delivered via their mobile devices.  Content should be sliced into manageable chunks that can be delivered via MMS or SMS (Wang & Shen, 2012).

M-learning, when appropriately created, will leverage Mayer's theory of multimedia message design and be multi-modal.  Video/Audio should be captioned to deliver content via many learning modalities at one time.  This approach takes advantage of the dual-coding learning theory (Wang & Shen, 2012).

I think M-learning will be much more powerful when we begin to incorporate the features of devices (photos, geolocation, augmented reality, voice, and video).  I envision connecting with my web-enabled television and smart tool to engage with my education in a whole new way when compared with how this content is delivered today.

References:

Gedik, N., Hanci-Karademirci, A., Kursun, E., & Cagiltay, K. (2012). Key instructional design issues in a cellular phone-based mobile learning project. Computers & Education, (58), 1149-1159.

Sarrab, M., & Aldabbas, H. (2012). Mobile learning & educational environment. International Journal of Parallel and Distributed Systems, 3(4).

Sighal, A., & Rogers, E. (2002). A theoretical agenda for entertainment education. Communication, 117-135.

Wang, M., & Shen, R. (2012). Message Design for Mobile Learning: Learning Theories, Human Cognition, and Design Principles. British Journal of Educational Technology, 43, 561-575.
http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-8535.2011.01214.x

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