Australian Teacher Impresses with Cell Phones in Learning

Australian educator Jarrod Robinson (Known as Mr. Robbo -- The P.E. Geek) has been doing some very impressive activities with cell phones in his instruction. He is a physical education teacher in Victoria, Australia. Below I describe a few of these innovative projects:

Most recently Jarrod has developed a QRcode orienteering activity for his students. Awesome! Below are the instructions to his activity from his Blog. Jarrod used a simple Google generator to create the QR codes.

1. The students will be working in pairs using their mobile phones and their QR code reading software.
2. The course will start with a single QR code, each pair will receive a different code so that they start at a different part of the course.
3. Students will scan their codes which will then reveal the directions they need to dial into their compasses and a riddle that gives clues as to the location of the first marker and the next QR code.
4. Half way throughout the course is a QR code with a difference, it contains a template for an SMS message that links directly to my mobile phone. Once scanned the students will send a text message that basically asks for the next clue, which will then be sent to them so they can complete the course.
5. The final QR code links to a downloadable Microsoft word document that details the questions they need to complete around the practical experience as related to the course.

Another activity that Jarrod has developed is sending homework to student cell phones through MMS messaging. Jarrod sends videos and pictures to students as part of their homework assignments. He sends a video message along with instructions to the students for their homework.

The third activity has a focus on using cell phones in exams. Jarrod is using SMS texting to help his students prepare for exams! He uses smsexpress to set up automatic SMS messages that are delivered to his students periodically over the course of the week leading up to the exam. Students receive the messages each day, which are actually questions from the exam. He even gives them options as to what time of day they prefer to receive the questions. As a result Jarrod feels that his students are able to research, collaborate, and better construct answers to his exam questions.

Finally, Jarrod had his students create a blog during their physcial education camping trip via their mobile phones using Utterli. Students posted pictures, audio, and text messages about their camping experience at Grampians National Park. He used the images and posts in their final assessment project! I think it is very smart to use student-collected data in the assement of units and projects! BRAVO Mr. Robinson, keep up the amazing mobile work! I'm very inspired.

Teacher Using Mobile Blogging with Students

Australian Teacher Steve Collis has been mobile blogging with his students for the past year!! His students have been using an international resource called Utterli (used to be Utterz) for their mobile blogging. Utterli works in over 25 different countries. Utterli allows mobile posting of audio, image, text, or video from any basic cell phone. The posts can automatically show up on just about any blog site or in an Utterli account.

Steve has helped to conduct two projects with his students. The first project, grade 11 students creating mobile audio reflections on Wordsworth, where the students would go out "into nature" and reflect on Wordsworth's poetry.


The second project, grade 9 students documented Australians geographical and biological environment. The students went outside and using their cell phones took pictures of plants, animals, or landscape in Australia.


Before the projects began Steve sent home permission forms for the parents to let them know what was happening with the project and cell phones. Steve has also created some tutorials on "how to" do these mobile postings in Utterli on his blog.

Survey Results: Favorite Cell to Web or Web to Cell tool!

I asked my educator friends on twitter to share their favorite cell to web or web to cell application. I want to thank everyone who replied. There were some of the expected outcomes such as Google sms or Flickr Mobile, but I was surprised at how many more obscure sites were referenced. A few of those that stand out are Loopt, Evernote, and Mofuse. Below are the ranked results.
#1) Flickr Mobile
#2) Polleverywhere
#3) Twitter
#4) Google sms, Dial2do, Netvibes, Mofuse, Jott, Qik, Pingfm, mobile gmail, mobile myvocal, Evernote, Loopt, OperaMini, Utterli (formerly Utterz).

tomgrissom @lkolb polleverywhere and dial2do

zecool @lkolb Web to mobile/cell: Mofuse. It makes my blog (Blogger) easily readible from cell. Can add comments, switch to standard view, etc.

KevinByers @lkolb Mine polleverywhere.com. Now if I could only get cell phones unbanned. I'm working on it!

paulrwood @lkolb my students use their phones for Google sms and polleverywhere in my classes.

drezac @lkolb twitter and jott

zemote @lkolb evernote is my favorite, followed by qik

dougsymington @lkolb Flickr may be best mobile web, tho pingfm and netvibes good too. Twitterberry one I use a lot on BB

mguhlin @lkolb Fav tool--email images/video to Flickr. You can't beat that when doing a workshop. "You're on the Web NOW." Response:"Wow

patsko @lkolb m.gmail.com and m.myvocal.com

tonitones @lkolb OperaMini closely followed by utterli or qipit

klmontgomery @lkolb Twitter Poll - My favorites are Mobile Fotos (Flickr) and JustUpdate (Twitter) for iPhone.

bjmcdonald @lkolb gotta be Flickr

ucdjoe As much as I might sound like a high school student, my favorite is the Facebook app, followed by Twitterific and Loopt.


Vote for your favorite! Feel free to add a comment if your favoite is not an option.

Inspiration: Mobile Photo Storytelling

Mobile post sent by elikeren using Utterz. Replies. mp3

I have been a bit obsessed with CNN's iReporters. While browsing the site, I noticed that they are creating photo "themes" and asking for story submissions. Here is an example called Flower Power, where they ask citizens to take a photo of a "flower" and tell a story from the photo. This caused me to think about students, mobiles, and storytelling. Students could use their photo enabled cell phones (hard to find a cell phone without the ability to capture photographs) in order to take an image, and text message (or narrate via audio) a story about their image. All the images could be collected into a particular site, such as a blog, so they can be displayed, comments could be added, or stories could be extended. For example, a math teacher studying geometry, could ask students to take images of geometric shapes they find in the real world and text message or audio message a short story about the shape, how they stumbled upon the shape, or any other relevant fact. I made an example above using Utterz to post from my cell phone. Although Flickr would also be a great option, since there are lots of slide shows that couple with a Flickr images.

Utterz...All-In-One mobile blogging! Free! Finally!

While there are some fantastic mobile blogging resources on the web, such as Gabcast, Gcast, Eyespot, Radar, evoca, Flickr, Jott, and Go@blogger.com, none of them allow you to post video, audio, text, and photos directly to a blog from their account. For example, Gabcast only posts audio, and Eyespot posts video, while Flickr only will post images. Now, of course you can set up accounts in all 3 of the aforementioned resources to post to the same blog, but the data will be housed in 3 separate places online. A little inconvenient for teachers and students. It is a also a reason why many teachers would be afraid to ask their students to mobile blog different types of media, because they do not want to deal with too many different web accounts. Now, I am come accross a resource called Utterz. It is the first resource I have found on the web that lets you mobile blog all 4 types of media to one place, from one account! Even better, it is international! So people from 25 different countries (and more), can use this free resource.

Let's look at the positives:
1) It is international, so people from around the globe can participate.
2) It is free to use.
3) You can use a landline (nice for students and/or teachers who do not have cell phones)
4) You can text, photo, video, or audio blogs from one account!
5) It has private options for posting!
6) You can post audio,text,images, and video on the same post from one phone.
7) You can "reply" to other "utterzs" and "listen" to them on your mobile phone.
8) You can receive alerts when someone comments or replys to your "utter"
9) The utters show up within a few seconds in your utter webspace.
10) You can "utter" back and forth with others via cell phone (no need to have computer or Internet access)

The downside:
1) Unlike some of the other resources I mentioned earlier, it is not a toll-free number (it is probably hard to do this since it is international), so if you use a landline, it will cost money (unless you have unlimited long-distance or use long-distance at an "unlimited talk" time)
2) there is some advertising (although it is off to the side and reasonable).
3) Utterz did show up on my blog posts within 10 minutes, but it showed up in my "drafts" box in blogger. This is not necessarily a negative because teachers who want to moderate posts, can then hit the published button after they have viewed/listened to the post. But if you want it to immediately post to a blog---it seems to have some trouble doing this, it might be because I have comment moderation on? I'm not sure.

Other than not having a toll-free number (maybe that will change?!), Utterz is a great resource for mobile blogging because it is all-in-one media blogging. This would be a great resource for students who are on field trips or a break from school. On their field trip, they could "blog" photos, videos, text, or audio to their Utterz account (or an external blog). Over Spring break students could do the same (maybe for extra credit...), for example if they are studying ecosystems in science class, they could post images of creatures and/or plants they find at the beach. Utterz could also be used as an up-to-date local newspaper. Students could post local event information, video, reports, and images as they are happening in their community.