BRIG-MOBIMOOC course- Draft Mobile Learning MHealth Project

Please comment on draft #mLearning #mhealth project- Building Resilience Interest Group BRIG using this blog post.

Mobile Tools-Like a child in a candy shop- I want them all

I enrolled in a course called mobiMOOC and as part of week one activities we were asked to “Pick one of the following mLearning tools: qr-codes, pictures taken via mobile device, movies via mobile device, ... and show us how you would use it for learning ... with a mobile device”

Like a child in a candy shop- I want them all. I can’t see the point of just picking one of the tools. 

I was thinking how these could be used in health promotion.

My thinking as health promotion professional is concerned with increasing social capital, social connectiveness and to draw inactive people into a more active life.

My target would be people in a socially disadvantaged areas. I'm thinking of trying to lure the physically inactive by easy increments into be physically active.  To reach this group, I will not be using any words that suggest the dreaded E words- exercise or exertion. I will using the F word - FUN.

I suspected I would make a simple Youtube type video to invite people to form small teams to participate in a localised scavenger hunt. Family teams from work places and teams where people went to get to know people would also be encouraged.

I would start out use these movies with social networking sites such as Facebook and Twitter to invite people to a scavenger hunt. I would also advertise the event and the Facebook events page with handbills, posters in local shops and poststops. The event would be locality based.

In terms of the scavenger hunt, I think you could use QR codes (Quick Recognition Codes) for clues, SMS or SNS posts and mobile pictures as evidence of being at a place at a time, I would also use QR codes for motivation messages about being involved in community organisations and suggesting ways of being more active. Such an event would fit well with the Swap It Don’t Stop It health promotion campaign my government and employer is supporting at the moment.

Other QR codes could include information on other locality subjects such as  geography, or history or natural features or about sun safety.

Mobiles phones could also perhaps be used to crowdsource hunt sites or clues. This would be part of the community engagement around the event.

Some may struggle to see this as learning project. It about learning that getting out and about in the neigborhood is FUN. It about getting to know good places to walk or connect with people in a locality.

The FUN  key element would be the gamification and prizes from local businesses.

This intervention  also draws upon the behaviour modification ideas of BJ Fogg  drawing on his purple pathway.

The course has also asked us think about  this question: What is the main concern for my mLearning project is devising is provoking and sustaining active participation for a core group of sufficient size and variety to support learning in the learning lurkers After all this is the main group, population wise.

My planning for mobile learning is not so much concerned about the ‘have’s” and the “have nots”. I fee confident from the data I’ve seen and the way our mobile market works, that in Australia that the take up of smart phones will become very widespread in a  few years time. I have been influenced by Craig Lefebvre thinking. Craig Lefebvre thinking that talks a division between the have now and the have not yet. Now is time to reinvent our work models, not the obsess about social exclusion.

It's the ideas that excite me not the mobile tech

I’m suspect I’m getting reputation among my health promotion/public health colleagues as being a bit of tech head. I think they like the idea of having someone around who seems to be into the new stuff just in case they ever need to find out about.

While I have always get on well with computers and ITC, I no guru. I find the thought  of being seen as a one as quite amusing.

Here is the truth. I am not a tech head-mobile guru.

In reality, I struggle to access mobile tools. My workplace has not been an early adopter and my personal budget constraints limiting my purchase of mobile devices.

At this stage, I mostly just dreaming about what is fast becoming possible because of

really fast Internet, a skilled public and mobile devices that are rapidly becoming cheaper to buy and connect.

Personally, I expect to purchase a high-end android mobile phone soon. Because it will need to offer great regional coverage. (In Australia this means it works with the phone company with best regional coverage and has a Blue Tick.) This points towards the Motorola Defy as being the optimal device for my needs. Also give my history of killing a succession phones in water, it water proofing feature is highly valued.

The good regional coverage that comes with phone is a critical selection criteria given where I live and work in regional Australia. It is also an important we plan latter this year to run our lives for four months via phones and other mobile devices as we do a camping tour of rural and remote Australia. On this trip I want to use mobile blogging as way of keeping touch with my seven year old class and their families and wider friends by a travel blog. This will help learn about good places to visit on our trip and help my daughter learn about mobile tools.

So far because of my access to technology, my mlearning has been limited.

Surprising on reflection, I find the two mobile learning devices important to me has been a cheap MP3 player and CDRom burner.

I use the MP3 device listen to podcasts while doing my 40 minutes walk to and form work. The CDRom burner has been important as I can listen to audio of lectures ect while on work related long drives around my region. I prefer this to driving for hours with earplugs in. Listening while driving is one advantage rural and remote workers have in terms of access to learning. In both cases, MP3 files coverts otherwise wasted time has become valuable learning time. Personally I enjoy listening to audio talks and I have very good recall. I suspect it is preferred learning style.

All am is a person who is a whole lot excited and little bit scared about the potential of the changes in the internet with truly fast internet and with mobile access.

A small part of me fears that these technologies my do to health promotion what the Personal Computer  did to the typing pool. But mostly I feel excited the new ideas more so that the tech. What excites me the poteitnal reach of the new tools and how they can be scaled up.

What excites me is idea like personal learning networks (PLNs) and connectivism not computer chips and new screen interfaces. Electronic CoPs not new release operating systems.