Mobile Information Literacy & Mobile Trends

I've attended two of the four Handheld Librarian Conferences (#HHLIB on twitter), and hope to attend many more. This was one of the most relevant conferences I've attended in a while, and one I recommend others consider in the future. It's affordable and as an online conference, accessible to most. (And the archives from years prior are accessible to all.)

I also appreciate that the conference has a good sized international group of attendees/participants. The US is often lagging when it comes to mobile and much can be learned from those outside our country with more experience.

I've embedded the slides here from my Handheld Librarian IV presentation (including links to videos shown during the presentation)
Newer technologies, like those I and others shared, can be fun and useful. However, there were meatier presentations as well, many given by excellent keynote speakers. I discuss one of those presentation below my slides.

Handheld librarian IV Feb 23, 2011 - QR Codes & Augmented Reality For Mobile Library Users

There were many valuable sessions during the two day conference, but for me there was one session, a keynote, that stood out - Presented by Andrew Walsh, University of Huddersfield:
"Handheld Information Literacy: Mobilising Existing Models?" Here is a link to the PDF of the presentation.

Research data (cited in the Walsh presentation, my presentation's first video link, and any Google search) confirms that mobile is of huge importance. Many industries are currently hyper-focused on mobile. I don't think most expected the level of exponential growth of mobile we've experienced quite so quickly. Even Google was off with mobile predictions. I know the recent Educause ECAR report on mobile undergraduate use caught me off-guard and I suspect most in higher education are still unaware of those statistics, no less thinking about the teaching and learning implications.

Libraries have been having mobile conversations for a while and many have created mobile sites or mobile library apps. Early adopters within libraries have been implementing simple mobile technologies like QR codes, and soon I expect we'll see more practical and location-based augmented reality used in libraries as well. However, few have begun to think about the larger implications of mobile and it's impact on libraries and educational institutions.

Those attending the Andrew Walsh presentation linked above were challenged to think deeper. The big questions he addressed: "What does all this wonderful technology mean to our users?" and "What does the mobilizing of search and information sources mean to our ideas of information literacy?"

Mr. Walsh presented a brief history of information literacy (IL) including a list of IL attributes fed into standards and models such as the ACRL 2000 standards, the SCONUL 7 Pillars and more. He then compared traditional competency based IL models (fixed IL) to more relational based mobile models and spoke on how mobile IL varies as mobile search can happen anywhere from a range of devices using the mobile web browser or specific apps. Search no longer happens in fixed controlled environments and since people are increasingly attempting to meet their information needs via handheld devices, IL is drastically changed. We need new models to reflect this change. What will it mean to libraries if most information needs are met while on the move?

A lot of food for thought was provided by the Walsh presentation along with Lee Rainie, Director of the Pew Research Center’s Internet & American Life Project, keynote on "The State of Mobile Connectivity" earlier in the day.

More questions than answers are apparent to me at this time, such as: How will mobile change our roles as librarians? What about mobile learning in the classroom and beyond? Will librarians eventually move from being embedded in classrooms and Learning Management Systems to provide more services via twitter and other mobile apps? What other services might we provide? Will librarians, many still expected to fill traditional librarian roles, be free of some of those responsibilities so they can begin to consider the impact of mobile within their organizations and work towards supporting mobile users?

Libraries and librarians are currently working hard to keep up with the digital revolution and the move from print to electronic. The move to mobile is yet another shift, which could further drastically change our traditional roles. How will librarians and libraries keep up and be able to support the needs of our unconnected users as well as our connected and increasingly mobile users? Will we receive the needed buy-in and support from administrators? Or will we be caught off-guard and in outdated librarian roles be seen as no longer relevant?

I've recently begun working on a collaborative research project with two School of Education professors related to mobile learning in K-20 classrooms and beyond. Naturally mobile learning would have a mobile information literacy component. I've been thinking hard about my role as a librarian and relevance, as is the case with many librarians these days. I'm thankful for librarians like Mr. Walsh and others who follow mobile trends from whom I can continue to learn as libraries and librarians help move their institutions into 21st century literacies.

I'm also glad there are IT leaders in higher ed who are focused in this direction as well. My university's CIO, Greg Smith, recently attended the ACU ConnectEd Summit 2011 and shared some thoughts on his blog and in the video below on "The State of Mobile Learning."

Future Virtual Worlds - Interoperability, Mobile Devices & Higher Education

There have been some recent developments regarding virtual worlds related to interoperability and mobile devices, which I believe will eventually impact higher education.

Mobile devices and eLearning is a hot topic amongst educators, and for good reasons. If you aren't familiar with that, please take a look at this post. It will become increasingly important to be able to run virtual worlds on these devices, though this is all in the very early stages.

Below are links to reports that keep me very interested in SL and Virtual Worlds in general. I have mixed feelings about some of these announcements, which may be due to a lack of understanding. I will continue to closely monitor the developments and hopefully gain insight along the way.

On Interoperability - From New Media Consortium, February 26, 2008 - "NMC Launches Open Virtual Worlds Project" "In launching the Open Virtual Worlds project, the NMC will build on its extensive presence in Second Life and add to the services it offers educational institutions with a suite of services aimed at those who need a secure extensible platform or simply prefer an open solution. Open Virtual Worlds will be a new project housed within NMC Virtual Worlds, along with its extensive Second Life project." I'm still trying to figure out exactly what this means. I have concerns over the increasing number of virtual worlds and interoperability seems like it could only be a good thing. But then there are the private/closed versus public/open virtual spaces, and I'm very uncertain over what this may mean in the end.

In this next article, from Virtual Worlds News, January 9, 2008 Interview: Samsung Building Consumer Electronics for Virtual Worlds, the importance of interoperability for mobile devices becomes apparent.

And lastly, below are links to articles on Second Life and virtual worlds running on cell phones/mobile devices. Some of the links include videos of devices that already run SL and I'm sure in 2008/09 there will be many more. This is most important for those universities who have already begun using iPhones or similar devices for eLearning. As educators continue to expand their presence in virtual worlds, it will be important for students who use mobile devices for eLearning to be able to access their virtual world learning environments with those devices as well. Again, eLearning in the US is in the very early stages, but this is an area expected to see much growth in the future.

Samsung Takes Second Life Mobile

Video: Comverse Brings Second Life to iPhones

And here is Second Life streaming to your mobile phone by Vollee

University Gives Away iPhones & Apple Computers

Yesterday I posted on Abilene Christian University and their plan to give students a choice between an iPhone or an iPod Touch and the teaching/learning applications they hope to implement on these devices. Days later another Chronicle article announced that Oklahoma Christian (OC) University will give away both an iPhone/iPod Touch AND an Apple laptop computer to all incoming freshman this next fall. According to the OC web page regarding mobile learning:

The vision of incorporating instructional technology tools into teaching and learning is critical to our future success and the success of our graduates. We are excited about this new phase of mobile learning at Oklahoma Christian University and will continue to search for ways to enhance teaching and learning.

On March 5, 2008 yet another Chronicle article suggests that giving away gadgets such as these is just a gimmick.

If they were giving away gadgets and computers with no plan in place to incorporate these technologies into the teaching and learning process, then I might agree. But as Phil J. Schubert, executive vice president for Abilene University stated, "What separates us from some of the fads of the past is that this is not a technology initiative, this is a learning initiative." And this is what I feel is important to understand. It doesn't really matter what device is used, what matters is what they will do with that device to add value. Students are already attached to handheld devices of some kind, therefore there is no need to wonder if they will use them. If colleges and universities implement teaching/learning applications that make sense and are easy to use, I believe they will be successful and mobile learning in the U.S. will finally take off.

So once again, if/when this happens, what will it mean to educators (and that includes librarians), in higher education? How might we contribute to this new teaching/learning platform?

iPhone, Mobile Devices & Higher Education

Abilene Christian University (ACU) plans to give all incoming freshman their choice of an iPhone or an iPod Touch. They recently uploaded two videos to YouTube. Titled "Connected Part 1: Social Uses" and "Connected Part 2: Academic Uses." If you work in U.S. higher education you will benefit from watching these two videos. The videos are fictional day-in-the-life accounts. The ACU vision is to make this a reality and that should be doable. Below is the summary from these videos posted on YouTube and the ACU Mobile Learing website under "A Vision of Convergence in Higher Ed."

What might a university look like with a fully deployed program of converged devices like the iPhone? Connected is one possible vision. This fictional day-in-the-life account highlights some of the potential benefits in a higher education setting when every student, faculty, and staff member is "connected." Though the applications and functions portrayed in the film are purely speculative, they're based on needs and ideas uncovered by our research - and we've already been making strides to transform this vision of mobile learning (mLearning) into reality.

It is good to see the U.S. getting caught up with other nations in the mobile device arena, and especially so within higher education. Many believe that 2008 will bring the most significant developments yet in the mobile device market. The cost for mobile devices has been continually dropping, the functionality has increased to the point that even the least expensive devices have quite a bit of smartphone functionality. Most importantly, young people in the U.S. are finally biting. The marketing has been successful largely due, in my opinion, to Apple's amazing marketing of the iPhone. The latest iPhone ads showing students how easily they can access their facebook accounts appears to have sealed the deal for many. And many devices costing much less than an iPhone will do the same. And don't forget Google's Android, which will be a part of many new devices released in 2008.

This will finally begin to impact U.S. higher education. Although higher ed is typically slow to adopt, once others like ACU implement these devices in the way the videos demonstrate, I'm sure others will follow. If they want to keep up and remain competitive, they may have no choice.

So what might this mean in 2-5 years for higher education? Why does it matter? What will it mean for academic librarians and all educators? How will this change what we do?

I Thought This Was a Joke

In Japan, half of the top ten selling works of fiction in the first six months of 2007 were composed on mobile phones. That is composed as in written, not read, on cell phones! And all along I've thought we need better keyboards or plugin portable keyboards for handheld devices before people will do much work on them. But then I'm a baby boomer.
From the Sydney Morning Herald: "In just a few years, mobile phone novels - or keitai shousetsu - have become a publishing phenomenon in Japan, turning middle-of-the-road publishing houses into major concerns and making their authors a small fortune in the process." We know that Japan is far beyond the U.S. when it comes to mobile phones, but this one caught me by surprise. TechCrunch also picked up this article and I enjoyed reading the 56 comments where I learned more about this phenomena.
I will continue to think mobile, I don't think we're that different from Japan (though I understand the long commutes and cultural differences) the UK, etc. I think it's only a matter of time for the U.S. And my post on Cell Phone College Class in Japan makes even more sense now.

Academic Libraries As Place

The librarians at my university will be meeting this week to discuss what is often referred to as "library as place." We will look at this from a couple of perspectives. We have all read and will discuss the third of a five part strategy in this article: Lewis, David W. “A Strategy for Academic Libraries in the First Quarter of the 21st Century.” May 2007. Freely available at the IUPUI Digital Archive(Revised version of “A Model for Academic Libraries 2005 to 2025.”) We will also discuss a report written by our library director on the library as place that addresses general trends and space use implications for our university.
Some of what I expect our group will discuss:
What should the academic library of the future look like? How will the needs of our students, faculty and staff be changing? How can we begin to address those needs (with limited funding) now? How should we prioritize the needs for now and in the future-what is most important? (And how will the role of the academic librarian fit into these new spaces? But that's probably another meeting.)
Ideally academic libraries will begin to incorporate technologies which address the changing needs of our students. As mobile learning continues to be developed in the U.S. students will need and appreciate spaces where they can come together to collaborate on projects or just to socialize. The video below gives us a taste of some of what I'm sure academic libraries of the future will include. I also think we can learn a great deal from watching how businesses are currently using new collaborative technologies such as this bar/lounge (scroll to photos of computer tables in lounge at the bottom of the page).
So if I was given a $25K donation right now to bring important future technologies into my academic library, I would begin by adding a wall size touch screen computer as shown in the video below along with at least one interactive digital table and a 4D Globe. My guess is these would be a hit with both students and faculty and the library would become a more desired and popular place on campus.

Mobile Learning-The Next Big Thing in U.S. Higher Education

The award winning Learning2Go partnership is currently the largest collaborative mobile learning project for pupils in the UK. Below is a quote from "21st Century Mobile learning becomes reality for learners in the City of Wolverhampton":

Put quite simply, if learners are to use the power of the internet and all of the content and authoring tools that are now available, they need access to a device at a time of their choosing and driven by their learning needs.

Some may say this is a ways off still for the U.S. Others will argue it's already here as some of our colleges and universities (and schools) have been moving in this direction. But I believe that soon mobile learning in colleges and universities will become ubiquitous in the U.S. The devices are finally becoming inexpensive enough, with increasingly high quality screen resolution and longer battery life. And with Google's Android and other open source programs there will be more Web based applications available than ever before. Also consider the increasing amount of digitized materials being made freely available along with ebook reader like capabilities on these devices. The handheld device makes sense for many reasons now including providing better pedagogical opportunities. Soon I can see students paying a little more than they currently pay for their cell phone text messaging machines for a machine that allows them to also take a class on their device or supplement their in-class coursework.
Of course librarians need to consider this as we continue to develop ways to best serve students and faculty. And academic libraries in some ways could become more important as a place where students gather to work and collaborate using larger touch screen computers and other technology to facilitate learning in groups. There's much to think about still but this is going to happen, it really is time.

Univ of Birmingham Wins JISC Award for Innovation, Excellence & Imagination

The e-course team at the School of Dentistry, University of Birmingham, won the JISC-sponsored ‘Outstanding ICT (Information and Communications Technology) Initiative of the Year’ award. The e-course they developed is wiki-based (so that anyone can create a new page, and set varying editing permissions), with a full range of social networking features, unrestricted file storage and sharing, podcasts, videos, wish lists, and anonymous feedback options, amongst others.
If you're interested in why they won, and quality innovative work, take a look at their welcome to the ecourse at birmingham uk page.

Online Courses Growing, Next is Mobile Learning

Online Nation: Five Years of Growth in Online Learning from the Sloan Consortium.
From NPR: Online Courses Catch On in U.S. Colleges. And from NPR on the University of Illinois online education. And the last sentence from the NPR article above:"If any of this seems strange, get over it. Because the next wave in e-learning about to crash on our shores is m-learning, as in mobile learning, delivered to your cell phone."

Cell Phone College Class

TOKYO (AP) — Japanese already use cell phones to shop, read novels, exchange e-mail, search for restaurants and take video clips. Now, they can take a university course. Take a look at this articleCell Phone College Class Opens in Japan"Our duty as educators is to respond to the needs of people who want to learn," Sakuji Yoshimura, who heads Cyber University.
It's coming, the USA is behind, but it will happen.