Summary
MOBILITY IN LEARNING: THE FEASIBILITY OF ENCOURAGING LANGUAGE LEARNING ON SMARTPHONES
by Keith Barrs
Introduction:
1. The potential of smartphone integration into language learning
In this era, smartphones
offer the greatest potential for such invisible integration of
technological hardware into language learning. These devices are
technologically superior to standard mobile phones, running on advanced
operating systems such as iOS (Apple), Android (Google) and Symbian
(Nokia) which allow for the use of high-resolution touch-screen
interfaces and smartphone-specific applications. As a mobile device they have “an affinity with movement between
indoors and outdoors, across formal and informal settings, allowing
learners to lead at least some of the way” (Kukulska-Hulme, 2009, p.
164), and they are usually owned by the students themselves, at a
relatively low-cost (Johnson et al, 2011). These characteristics mean
that smartphones have the potential to become important devices not only
in language learning in general but particularly in Self Access
Language Learning (SALL). SALL is an approach to learning where the
focus is on the promotion of learner autonomy by moving students away
from dependence on the teacher and towards independence in managing
one’s own learning (Gardner & Miller, 1999). Smartphones can greatly
assist students in managing their learning by giving them mobile and
independent access to materials and resources.
2. The motivation for smartphone research
The motivation for the research was the
observation in the researcher's classrooms in which smartphones were becoming more and
more common, as a device owned by the students and regularly brought to
the classes as a standard item of the students’ possessions. Through the researcher's
own experience with a smartphone, he had come to recognize its
potential language-learning applications such as its usefulness as
voice recorders, the ability to photograph and store digital pictures of
board work, and the proliferation in specific language learning
applications (see Godwin-Jones, 2011), such as Cloudbank (a database of
informal English usage), Anki (a flashcard programme) and Sounds (an app
to help with pronunciation). It appeared that in my classes,
smartphones had the best potential to become a normalized language
learning technology, both inside and outside of the classroom, and this
normalization would bring with it opportunities not only for use in
class but also for promotion of language learning activities that could
be achieved beyond the classroom.
Methodology:
Participants: 80 students of Kanda University, Japan.
Tool: Survey questionnaire
Research Questions:
(1) What is the extent of smartphone ownership among the students in my
classes?
(2) Do students use their smartphones for language learning?
Findings and Discussion:
1. Investigating research question 1: The issue of normalization
The concept of normalization is an important one in discussions of
Computer Assisted Language Learning (CALL). Bax (2003) states that
normalization of technology occurs when it “becomes invisible, embedded
in everyday practice” and when the technology is “hardly even recognized
as a technology, taken for granted in everyday life” (p. 3). It is then
that the technology will be at its most useful in language learning
contexts, because it can be used “without fear and inhibition, and
equally without an exaggerated respect for what [it] can do” (p. 3). So
if a normalized state of technology in language learning is considered
as something which is both achievable and desirable (Bax, 2003, p. 24)
then it is necessary to consider what piece of technology has the best
potential for becoming normalized, the extent to which the normalization
is in progress and the opportunities afforded by the integration of
this technology. A questionnaire given out to the researcher's classes (80 students) at the end of
the 2010/2011 academic year (January) showed that only 25% owned a
smartphone. This showed that the technology was popular, but not yet
normalised in wider society or a ‘natural’ part of the make-up of a
student’s everyday possessions. Data which is
echoed in the Horizon Report (Johnson et al., 2011) stating that
“virtually 100% of university students worldwide come equipped with
mobiles” (p. 13). The proliferation of smartphone hardware (such as the
predicted release of the iPhone 5 in late 2011 and the acquisition of
the Motorola company by Google in order to focus on mobile
technologies), and the ever-increasing number of apps in stores such as
iTunes (Apple) and Android Market (Google), suggests that mobile phones
will be most likely updated to smartphones when contracts end or phones
are lost/broken. That is unless a new technology is released in the
intervening period which comes to replace the smartphone.
2. Investigating research question 2: Using a smartphone for language learning
According to The Horizon Report (2011), “people expect to be able to
work, learn and study whenever and wherever they want” (p. 3).
Smartphones can be a useful technology in this regard, especially in
relation to learning, primarily because of their mobility but also due
to the functions and applications available on the device. Smartphones
allow anywhere, anytime access to an ever increasing amount of
information and resources through functions and applications such as
cellular calls, Instant Messaging services (IM), audio/video recording,
wireless Internet access, social-networking applications, mobile
dictionaries and flashcard programs. However, it is important to acknowledge that ownership of a
smartphone does not necessarily mean that they are being used for
language learning purposes. It is therefore also important to
investigate first of all whether or not students who own smartphones are
(1) already using them for language learning or (2) willing to use them
for language learning, and then to investigate the particular ways in
which they can be used. From the initial questionnaire given to the researcher's
2010/2011 classes (80 students), in January 2011, he found that of the 20
students who owned smartphones, 15 had already used their smartphone in
a way which they considered to be for language learning. Several of
these uses are listed below:
- The camera was used to photograph board-work written up by the teacher, for example homework assignments and instructions.
- The built-in voice recorder on the iPhone was used to record a pair-presentation practice session and then this recording was self-reviewed for features that the teacher had said would be assessed, such as fluency and pronunciation.
- One student had heard about the ability to search in Google by voice with the Google App and wrote that checking to see if the app would respond correctly to her oral search terms was fun pronunciation practice for her.
- Several students said they used flashcard apps such as Gengo Flashcards which is an integrated app that allows you to create flashcards using your own photographs along with inputted text which can be spoken back to you in a range of languages.
- Some students mentioned they use English language news apps such as BBC, CNN, Discovery, Time and MTV.
Of the 5 students who answered that they felt they hadn’t yet used
their smartphone for a specific language learning activity, 4 answered
that they would be interested in learning about what functions/apps were
good for this purpose. The remaining 1 student answered that he/she had
no wish to use their smartphone for specific language learning
activities because he/she didn’t like using technology in this way. This
student said he/she enjoyed using textbooks for language learning and
the smartphone was just for calling and simple Internet access in
Japanese. Although limited, this data indicates that even if some students
already know how to use their smartphones for language learning, a key
role for instructors can be to encourage and support all learners
in how smartphones can be used for particular language activities. This
can be done through classwork and homework which makes use of the
devices and with the promotion of free/paid apps that teachers feel
would be useful for the learners to use. Such promotion could be done
through an ‘app of the week’ style segment of a lesson or in
class/institution newsletters.
Conclusion:
From the results of the first administration of the questionnaire,
combined with what has been written on learners’ and educators’ blogs
and in articles about smartphones in general society and specific
learning environments, the researcher predicts that this on-going investigation will
reveal that the number of students in his classes who own a smartphone
will continue to rise, most likely rapidly because of the current
popularity and availability of the devices across most mobile networks. He
also predict that smartphones will become normalized in Japanese
society within 1-2 years and potentially be readily available to all
students for use both in and out of the language learning classroom. He
anticipates that the research will also help reveal in what ways
smartphones are already being used for language learning, which can
assist teachers in encouraging and supporting smartphone use by language
students. Normalization of this technology will help to re-define
educational practices by giving more opportunities for students to
access and manage their own learning, with the guidance and pedagogical
support of the teachers.
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