If anyone needed evidence that mobile learning is a hot topic, the growth in attendance at mLearnCon 2011 – over 600 attendees, 55% more than last year – should be proof enough.
This reflects the explosion in mobile activity, as noted in the recent
report from flurry.com that mobile app consumption in
the US (in terms of minutes per day) now consumes more user time than
Web consumption.
Figure 1. The opening general session at mLearnCon 2011 was packed.
Paul Clothier did a great job of putting together the program. The sessions covered the breadth and depth of mLearning extremely well. The range of topics included not only strategy and tactics for designing and implementing mobile learning, but also for mobile support and the fusion of mobile and social learning.
Four busy days
As with all conferences produced by The eLearning Guild, mLearnCon 2011 provided a variety of session formats and networking activities in order to maximize learning opportunities. Monday, June 20 was devoted to day-long pre-conference workshops. Each day of the conference proper, June 21 to 23, began with AM Learning sessions (organized by region, industry, and topic on succeeding days). Keynotes launched Tuesday and Wednesday’s activities, followed by over 100 concurrent sessions, activities on three stages around the conference venue, an extensive Expo, and evening activities. The conference ended with an engaging panel discussion between some of the thought leaders in the mobile field.
Topics of interest
While many who attended mLearnCon 2011 were already engaged in ongoing mobile learning projects, many other came in order to get a good understanding of mobile learning: strategy, design, best practices, implementation tips, and other information from those who “have been there already.” This was apparent not only from the conversations that I overheard and the discussions in the AM Learning sessions, but also from the attendance at the various sessions.
Pre-conference
About a quarter of the delegates came early for one of the five pre-conference workshops. Strategic sessions on converting existing content and on the basics of mobile learning, and tactics for preparing content for iOS devices were most popular.
Concurrent sessions
Attendance at the concurrent sessions also reflected similar content interests among delegates. Highest attendance was in the strategic sessions relating to management and design, including selection of topics for mobile delivery, the use of mobile devices for performance support, and the use of social media and games for mLearning. There was also substantial attendance at sessions that gave detailed tips on development and implementation. Technical topics on mobile SCORM implementation and UI/UX design rounded out the choice of large numbers of attendees.
Keynotes
Jeremiah Owyang provided the opening keynote, with an emphasis on how the information and learning landscapes have changed with the arrival of mobile technology. His key point was that “mobile” means too many things to too many different people, so it can be difficult to develop a strategy for it. It is essential to research how people are using mobile technology (and the intimately associated social media) before you build your mLearning app or content. He then addressed the various ways in which groups organize and manage information flow, with key insights for the effects of each of these models on learning.
Figure 2. Jeremiah Owyang’s opening keynote emphasized the changing landscape.
On the second morning, journalist and strategist Amber MacArthur spoke about “What if Mobile Learning and Social Learning Had a Baby.” This was fast-paced and entertaining. Amber reviewed strategies for success with mobile learning when social media is part of the strategy, and some of the tools (such as policytool.net) that make a difference. At the conclusion, she reviewed five key mobile trends that mLearning designers must be aware of: augmented reality (AR), gamification, location-based services, crowdsourcing, and automated storytelling.
Figure 3. Amber MacArthur gave a fast-paced look at the changing landscape of mLearning in the second keynote.
Closing panel
The closing panel for mLearning 2011 consisted of thought leaders Richard Culatta, Jim Box, Carmen Taran, Clark Quinn, David Metcalf, and William Rankin, moderated by Paul Clothier. The panel took questions from the audience that were selected according to interest weightings, and offered their insights and solutions to the challenges.
Figure 4. The closing panel addresses a question from the attendees (Richard Culatta, Jim Box, Carmen Taran, Clark Quinn, David Metcalf, William Rankin)
Expo
A key part of the experience for many attendees was the Expo. This year’s large collection of vendors brought another view of mLearning, plus tools and several important product launch announcements. (Several of these announcements are also Learning Solutions Magazine news items.) Considering the general desire for information that delegates brought with them, the vendors probably did as much education as they did product presentation.
Figure 5. The Expo drew a lot of interest
Blogosphere and backchannel
In any conference these days, the bloggers and the tweeters provide a vital function: sharing the wealth of the experience with those who could not attend. Here are some of the more interesting and complete blog commentaries that appeared during and just after mLearnCon 2011.
Jeff Tillett: http://floatlearning.com/2011/06/day-one-mlearncon-2011/
Nick Floro http://nickfloro.com/html5-and-css3-great-web-sites-and-resources
Clark Quinn http://blog.learnlets.com/
Geoff Stead: http://moblearn.blogspot.com/2011/06/mlearncon-presentation.html
The Making of A Game of Phones: http://www.slideshare.net/hybridlearning/the-making-of-a-game-of-phones
David Kelly was one of the “remote attendees.” He captured much of the Twitterstream in his blog, Misadventures in Learning. David also provided the Spotlight that we are publishing today (“Lessons Learned from the mLearnCon 2011 Backchannel”) to explain how to make maximum use of the backchannel.
Tracy Parrish provided a lighter look at the Tweetstream, and you can also read through an extensive analysis of the Tweets here. As usual, the stream continues to flow even though the conference has been over for a week.
What’s next?
It’s fair to say that this event in 2012 will be different in terms of attendee interest, technology advances, and content – perhaps much different. We will understand more about mLearning and how to use the mobile connection to social learning. We will have more examples and best practices. There will be more authoring tools that support mLearning. Mobile devices are developing the capacity to communicate directly with each other via Wi-Fi in ad hoc networks, and to support local collaboration on projects via apps (example: CollabraCam). A continuous connection to the cloud, or even to phone service, will not always be necessary in order to use these apps. We can expect considerable development in all these areas in the next twelve months.
All things considered, by next summer the answer to “What’s next” will be an eLearning Guild event that you will find irresistable!
