Mobile UC inside & outside the classroom 2/4

Has this ever happened to you? You select random on your playlist and Shazam you hit a song that you know very well but upon a another listen.....you hear something different, unique and engaging.

I've been a lukewarm fan of the punk rock trio, The Police. But upon further digging I discovered layers of music I never heard over commercial radio. The distinctive marriage of rhythm, bass and guitar provide a unique mash-up of ska, punk, pop and rock. Add in a funky time signature and a catchy guitar riff and it is a completely different presentation of the song. Da do do do ...da da da....indeed!


Turning to mobile, how are we encouraging students to develop, program, build, architect something cool -  relevant and necessary!

Mobile use cases inside & outside the classroom 1/4

Over the next four weeks, we'll explore some unique use cases from inside and outside of the classroom. To kick-off this week's post, our guest blog is presented by Jon Eby, from our mobile software dev team. 

There's a question I frequently find myself dealing with that I'm not a very big fan of:

 "Where do you see mobile in the classroom going?"

This is usually followed by a discussion or at least a few comments about texting in class, poor attention spans, people being more comfortable messaging each other than actually talking to each other, and so on.

Best practices for students building mobile apps for mLearning

Recently, I sat down with Bill Lee, our product manager of mobility capturing a few ideas and thoughts about encouraging students to embrace mobile application development. 

Additionally we discussed insights for students to build out their portfolio and work experience thru contests and networking events. (see video below)

Impressive line up of Judges and Guest Speakers for D2L's Pitch Night

Downtown Kitchener will be the place be Wednesday, March 28th as eager young minds share their ideas to transform education through mobile and web technology with the end goal: improve a learning experience.

Sponsored by Procom; the event will take place 5-8pm at the iconic Tannery Building. With a Grand Prize of $1,000 and several door prizes and mentoring opportunities -  this event promises to bring forth fresh ideas that will impact a positive learning experience inside and outside the classroom.

Judges:

Mobile Development Challenge Starts at the Grassroots for mLearning

Published on Desire2Learn's learning insight blog (Tues, March 20th)

During the past few months, I’ve had a great opportunity to engage with students and faculty at our local Conestoga College. In one of my several visits, I discovered their inaugural ‘4x4 Challenge’ – an internal technology development contest that really peeked my interest. I was intrigued; why would students dedicate Reading Week (their week off from school!) to work on a project that may never see the light of day? Not to mention, with limited resources and time (4 days x 4 nights), could they even pull it off?

After speaking with Ignac Kolenko, Chair of the School of Engineering and IT at Conestoga College, the answer was a resounding ‘yes’.  Innovation and ideas are thriving at a grassrootslevel. Students are self-motivated, driven, and have a great deal of pride to deliver something meaningful – something that matters.

Your idea + Mobile + Education= mLearning

For the past few months, we've been talking about innovation, mobility and transforming education thru mLearning. At the foundation of any big idea there are several small ones that are not so perfect, well thought out or even sound half intelligent. 

Do you remember the first time you took a spin on your new bike without training wheels? I still have a scar on my forehead to remind me of that day. Luckily for my daughter , she has transitioned from training wheels to balancing on two wheels in less then week. Unlike her Dad - she has a helmet and knee pads.  


How does transformation takes place? Do we step out of fear and embrace bravery? Why are so afraid to get up in front of people and share an idea? It is really true that more people are afraid of speaking in public then dying? 


So here it is - Desire2learn is providing a platform not to be perfect for one night. 
Bring your idea - your pitch - tell the world (it will be recorded) how education will benefit from your gem and change (the game) how mobility is used in our schools, on campus and how we learn......(how to enter below)

5 ways to avoid mobile application lost and found + $25,000

Last week we discussed how 33 innovative College students spent four days building out several comprehensive mobile modules for their Campus contest. Aside from endless amounts of coffee and pizza – the end goal was to showcase a working prototype and gain invaluable industry experience.

So – what’s next for these young entrepreneurs? How can they further gain exposure and interest in their mobile application? Are there opportunities to commercialize their project? How do we instill innovation, creativity and building something that matters…..?