Do you use or have you used a mobile platform for professional development? Either personnally or as a developer.

For years now, there's been a lot of talk about using a mobile platform for professional development. 

Some of the stated benefits include its convenient "on-the-go" access, flexibility, and penchant for bite-sized, focused learning experiences.

Considerations when designing mobile learning experiences include responsive design, simplified navigation, multimedia optimization for engagement, mobile-friendly assessments, and offline access, to identify a few.

Questions:

As a learner, have you used mobile-friendly learning? How would you describe your experience?

As a professional developer/administrator, do/have you use(d) mobile-friendly professional elearning?

     If so, how do you design engaging, accessible, and user-friendly learning experiences?

 

We love to hear from our members who are experts in the field. Please share!!

Comments

Hey, there,

I've participated in mobile learning for many years.  It began with our California state's PD lead agency, CALPRO and their use of it for both synchronous and asynchronous learning activities in the platform Moodle.  I've also several others for other personal learning and teaching and I've been a fan since Day 1 because the experience is self-directed and self-scheduled with supports and feedback from teachers and colleagues to deepen learning and create community.   

At our agency, we have been using a learning management system (LMS) for staff PD since before Covid.  Only during and after Covid did teacher use really take off.  We use Schoology as it was adopted by our K-12 school district leadership.  We emphasize asynchronous work that highlights community-building, discussions, resource sharing, and actionable feedback.  While I love discussions, there is a place for auto-corrected comprehension checks.  The gradebooks and progress monitoring features help everyone involved and we can connect to Google suite items to collect learner information for targeted instruction and feedback.

To keep learning engaging, it's critical as a facilitator to be very engaged primarily at the beginning and the end of the course/PD to let people know they are seen and to create connections and timely closure of all activities.  In the middle, it's best to find learning trends and to connect and engage learners with the material and each other.  I step back a little to let the learning be more constructivist and group developing.

Best practices for "engaging, accessible, and user-friendly learning experiences":  

  • Allow for voice and choice in how learners engage and demonstrate learning
  • Use engaging visuals and simple language and lots of scheduling help and reminders for busy professionals
  • Surveys and checklists of best practices to which participants respond and share what they do/what they'd like to do create great exposure and let learners ID what they want to emphasize in their work

  • Make sure to check how formating and content look on smartphones, so that learning is truly accessible "on the go"

    Big thanks to my friends at CALPRO for teaching me almost everything I know!

    Dave