Guest Post: 5 Effective Ways of Maximizing Mobile Tech In Learning Pursuits

This week we will start off with a guest post from Jenni Birch who writes about apps, computer art, music and the latest developments in technology. Thanks Jenni for agreeing to post some of your thoughts on mobile tech and learning.

Photo courtesy of Verizon Wireless

 Due to Bring Your Own Device (BYOD) scheme in various educational institutions, the study habits of college students have dramatically evolved over the past few years. Based on 2013 Ed Tech Magazine’s data, 94% of college students (18-24 years old) in traditional American colleges own and use mobile devices for academic pursuits.  They practically use it for eLearning by conducting online searches, visiting virtual libraries, streaming media contents, and purchasing ebooks. But mobile technology (m-tech) can also be maximized for information dissemination via cloud storages. They can even utilize it for authoring documents and creative presentations. For this entry, we’ll give you five ways on how students of higher education can maximize the power of m-tech.

In Book “Hunting” Venture

According to a Verizon’s “Going Back To School As An Adult,” students maximize the use of mobile internet to ‘hunt’ for alternative learning resources, the moment their professors give out the required reading list. Before they head out to campus bookshops to purchase a newly printed paperback, students would first  check online resources like CourseSmart to find ebook and digital counterparts, that are accessible on laptops, tablets, and smartphones. With m-tech, they can quickly make comparisons from various shops and find cheaper solutions. They can also scan textbook barcodes with their phones to find the best available online deals.

Attending MOOCs

Stands for Massively Open Online Courses, the MOOCs are free college classes available for everyone with an internet. Basically, it’s an uploaded recording of lectures and discussions from a pool of experts in various fields of expertise. College students can attend to MOOCs during free periods using their mobile devices. They can even react to these classes by posting a comment or interacting with live fellow viewers. It’s basically an added learning opportunity for them, apart from the traditional classes they are attending to.

Cloud Storages

With the advent of cloud storages, students are given an avenue to keep and to share digital learning resources over the web. They can store articles and web clippings, images, ebooks, documents, and other learning resources over cloud services like Dropbox and SkyDrive.  Printing out a hard copy for archiving and compilation is no longer needed. Should they wish to read and to access them  afterwards, all they need is to sign-in with their respective accounts on their smartphones and tablets.  Since these gadgets are with them for 24/7, they can access these files anytime of the day provided that they are equipped with mobile internet. With cloud technology,  it’s like carrying with them their multiple learning resources wherever they go.

Audio Recording

When students tend to procrastinate because of simultaneous homeworks, term papers, projects, and work; there is a possibility that they will resort to inactive participation during classroom lectures. If the professor permits the use of a mobile device (and if the campus itself is implementing the BYOD policy), the procrastinating student can record the lectures instead and listen to it afterwards, like a podcast.

Email and VoIP

With mobile internet, students are also given the power to communicate with their professors in a formal manner. They can maximize this medium to seek consultations, reading  recommendations, and expert’s advice. Study groups can exchange insights and critique each other’s work prior to submission without the need for them to meet all the time. Plus, with Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) services like Skype and Google Hangouts, it is possible to make this venture more personal despite being totally virtual.

These are five  ways on how students can maximize m-tech for academic pursuits. As powerful as it seems, it still relies upon one’s hard work and determination.

For a definitive list of apps to make you smarter, you can refer to this post. Or you can subscribe to our Articles & Whitepapers section for the different trends of learning such as Games and Gamification, Rapid eLearning, Informal Learning and more.

About the Author

Jenni Birch usually writes about apps, computer art, music and the latest developments in technology. Her other passions include playing tennis and social media, like Twitter and Google+.