Cell Phones and Education
August 21, 2007 | By Kevin Zolkiewicz
Video blogger Robert Scoble recently sat down with Dr. Elliot Soloway, a professor at the University of Michigan and CEO of GoKnow Learning. Dr. Soloway discussed some of the issues in today’s educational system and how technology—cell phones in particular—can help.
Notebooks Not The Answer?
In an effort to incorporate technology, many schools have promoted the idea of giving every student a notebook or tablet computer. However, Dr. Soloway is pushing a different device, one that today is banned in most K-12 classrooms: the cell phone.
Today nearly every teenager owns a cell phone. Instead of banning them, why not leverage these devices for learning and incorporate them into the classroom? As more powerful cell phones with WiFi capabilities drop in price, they present the opportunity of becoming very low cost learning platforms.
The Complete Interview
Scoble’s complete video interview with Dr. Soloway is available below. They talk about several ways that the cell phone and other technologies will revolutionize learning. It’s a very fascinating discussion that I highly recommend viewing.