Biophone: A design study of a mobile learning environment for secondary school biotope projects Abstract: Senior secondary school students in Israel majoring in biology are required to conduct a biotope research project. This poster presents a design study conducted by students at a graduate course on mobile learning, in which they designed, developed and evaluated a mobile, collaborative, guided learning environment, to support Biotope projects. This mobile learning environment aimed to enhance students’ learning skills and facilitate effective communication with their teacher. The students and the teacher in the experiment group found the system user-friendly and effective in supporting their teaching and learning practices.

1. A design study of a mobile learning environment for secondary school biotope projects
Chely Cohen Perach Dimerman Orit Mogilevsky Yishay Mor
chelycohen@gmail.com perahd@tzafonet.org.il oriti.mog@gmail.com Yishay.Mor@open.ac.uk
• Senior secondary school students in Israel majoring in biology are required to conduct a • Create a mobile, collaborative, guided learning environment, through which
biotope research project. students can explore their Biotope using innovative technology tools that will
• The research includes field work away from the school. contribute to streamlining and improving their research process.
• Demands collection of large amounts of data from a wide range of sources, including • Design a mobile educational environment that enhance students’ learning skills and
surveying, plant identification, and environmental characteristics. create an opportunity for communication with the teacher on a personal level.
• The necessary equipment includes measuring instruments, books (guides for plants, animals, • The learning environment will provide the students many research opportunities to
etc.) cumbersome to take on field trips. promote curiosity and motivation.
• Difficulties in data collection, documenting the process and the use of outdated and cumbersome • Assimilate information, identify, collect, and process data for their research project
measurements. using mobile tools.
• Lack of access to information inhibits the progress of research. • Expand their knowledge by effectively finding and using relevant information on
• Logistics of the teacher and the inability to accompany and guide a number of groups in different computerized databases focusing on research work by utilizing mobile devices.
places simultaneously. • Explore computer-aided methods and techniques for data collection and
• Finding relevant information measurements.
• Connectivity, classroom space, between students and teachers. • Use mobile devices to document the important characteristics and phenomena in
Target audience: senior secondary school students majoring in biology and their teachers (age 16-18). the biotope they choose to study. Apply skills of data entry, reporting and
documentation of data collected, measured and recognized in the field using the
mobile device.
• Socio - constructivist, knowledge construction based
on previous knowledge in social interaction.
• Students constructs their knowledge through
interaction with teacher and peers.
• Using a mobile device adds a dimension of
mediation which increases the interaction and
allows sharing of information.
Roland. P, Lawrence V. Svec, Lynn M. Cowen (2005), Social
constructivism in practice: case study of an elementary school's
mathematics program
The research group is made up of biology students in the 11th grade, aged 17, nine
• The development of a collaborative learning environment with a guided web students divided into three groups.
site that combines mobile and smartphone mobile technologies. • Nine students were selected from a biology class The students were very
• The website will serve as a project workspace, a portable reference tool, and a enthusiastic about participating in the study, and particularly motivated to use their
repository of study content and work instructions, and a locus for documenting the mobile phones in the course of their field studies.
research process and data collected. • Students were highly proficient mobile users, owning a variety of devices (iPad,
• Mobile technology enables access to information, data collection and analysis. Android phones and iPhones).
• Students use the website frequently in the course of their work. They report that
the interface is user friendly, contains necessary details and can be used
• Enable context- and content-dependent knowledge construction
independently. In addition, using the links from the website for obtaining
• Support collaborative construction of knowledge through social negotiation, not
information was crucial for them in the field/in real time.
competition
• The students enter observations data via on line forms and receive the data in an
• Mediation: Use mobile learning to mediate knowledge construction
organized and clear fashion, for analysis and processing as part of their follow-up
• Provide real world, case based learning environments rather than pre-determined
desk research.
instructional Use mobile learning to produce and consume knowledge.
• The biology teacher is very satisfied with the use of the Biophone website to
Collins, A. (1996). Design issues for learning environments
support the Biotope study. She acknowledges the contribution of the organized
Kali, Y. (2008). The Design Principles Database as means for promoting design-based research
Kali, Y., & Linn, M. C. (2007). Technology-enhanced support strategies for inquiry learning data and the collected information to the learning process. In addition she sees an
advantage to the feedback she can offer as a result of the visibility of the data
regularly processed.
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License. The project is supported by