Relatório final / Final report

Relatório final do trabalho de projecto: Jovens, telemóveis e escola.

Final Report of the research project: Youth, mobile phones and school.

Final step and follow-up

My work project has come to an end. At the 16th of April I presented the final report. Just before, I went to New York for Easter’s holydays (first time in USA), and had to find time to prepare myself for the presentation. This is a picture of one of the work moments, at a coffee shop in Broadway ;-)

This project inspired a new one: a teacher support online discussion board “mSchool” that aims to promote and facilitate the use of mobile phones as a curricular resource.
I presented the theoretical background and the design concept on the 3rd WLE Mobile Learning Symposium: Mobile Learning Cultures across Education, Work and Leisure, 27 March 2009, WLE Centre, IOE London, UK. The paper name is: Does school fit in mobile phones? The whole world does, and the extended abstract is available at http://symposium.londonmobilelearning.net/?page=Programme.

The web link is http://www.m-escola.com/, but it is only available in Portuguese.

This blog will enter a period of suspension ... until ...
Any comments or suggestions are welcome :-)
Please mail me: epcferreira@gmail.com

Mobile phones in classroom

This is an example of my school rules about the use of mobile phones in classroom. There is a box in the teacher's desk to keep all the student's mobile phones during class. They should deposit them at the beginning of class and pick them up at the end.

But usually the box is always empty. No teacher tries hard enough to obey the rule. But the boxes remain on the teacher’s desk.

Student’s focus group results

Student’s focus group on the use of mobile phones in school activities (7th, 8th and 9th grades)

Some sentences that may give us some notion of what mobile phones mean for young people:
My phone is ... everything, is everything to me. It is where I check the time, it is where I keep notes and alarms so I don’t forget things I have to do. It is the way I connect with people. Without my mobile phone I would no longer know what to do .
…
I sleep with my mobile phone under the pillow, and sometimes I go to sleep holding it in my hand.

After analysing the results of the 3 focus groups with students, I came across these common issues:
» Mobile phone is always present in various contexts of their lives, with one exception: school (classrooms, curricular activities)
» Mobile phone attraction has functional and emotional dimensions
» Mobile phone communication aspect is the most important
» Most used features are low cost or free, and enable communication / connection with others
» Mobile phones use in school activities is perceived as possible and desirable

Are we all becoming "The Big Brother"?

I just read this article that made me wonder and worry about privacy issues.

Science
The Cellphone, Navigating Our Lives
By JOHN MARKOFF
Published: February 17, 2009
Cellphones have changed how we communicate with others, and now they are changing how we think about information.

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/02/17/science/17map.html