As I am writing this I first need to come clean: I am a mobile technology crusader. I believe cellular technology has a unique role to play in education in general and in Africa in particular. Against this backdrop, it is encouraging to see South African entrepreneurs launching innovative and specific solutions for our local market.
Mobi is a product of IT School Innovations, a technology and training company with a vision to ‘use best educational practices to deliver an exciting interactive learning experienceâ€.
Mobi is aimed at high school students taking mathematics and addresses the basic skills needed from grade eight and nine to the learning outcomes of the further education and training mathematics curriculum for grades 10 and 11. Grade 12 students are supported with the outgoing syllabus. When I looked at Mobi, the platform was in its final phase of testing before going ‘live†on July 17 this year. After this date new users will have a seven-day trial period, after which certain sections of the site will only be accessible by a monthly subscription fee.
Mobi can be accessed from a PC with internet access (www.mymobi.co.za) or through most Java-enabled cellphones with wireless protocols such as GPRS or 3G. It can be downloaded for free and the user gains access to Mobi maths, Mobi chat and Mobi radio.
The content has been developed with the specific needs and limitations of mobile phones in mind. The result being some dead space on a PC screen but an adequately functional display on the limited screen of a mobile phone.
Mobi maths gives the user access to tutorials in the form of streamed videos. The tutorials are divided into a ‘quick find†search function, ‘basics†that cover skills needed, ‘theory†covering the learning outcomes, ‘examples†and ‘exercisesâ€.
For grade 12 there is an additional section with ‘previous papers†which offer matric papers of 2004 to last year with solutions. For students who ‘don’t know, what they don’t know†there is a Mobi assessor. This function determines the student’s proficiency at the hand of various mathematical questions and directs them to the relevant content to revise skills they are lacking.
Mobi chat offers the opportunity for students to form study and discussion groups by inviting friends to participate using their cellphones. This is a closed chat room and won’t be visible to lurkers or users not invited to join.
Through Mobi radio students can listen to music and it is envisaged that this can eventually be used as an interactive platform for students to phone in and discuss specific problems with a specialist host.
The tutorials, examples and worked exercises can be paused or bookmarked so that students can use spare moments to revise work and return to a session later. Some students might find the small screen uncomfortable, but the portability and anytime access goes a long way to compensate for it.
Mobi tries to support a personal cooperative learning space with the presentation adding a human touch. The community idea is further supported by the chat-room function that would enable private discussions among students.
Neither cellphones nor computers will ever replace a teacher in the classroom, but this application has the potential to support students with a ‘just in time†ubiquitous environment.
Adele Botha heads ICT at Cornwall Hill College in Pretoria and is an educational researcher at Meraka, the CSIR’s African advancement institute of ICT
What is Mobi?
A South African technology and training company has launched a unique educational tool for mobile devices, which allows learners to chat, listen to the latest music — and learn mathematics.
Mobi — believed to be the first of its kind in the world for mobile devices — will turn cellphones into edutainment devices.
‘To our knowledge this is the first time anyone has launched a mobile edutainment application of this scope,†says Lieb Liebenberg, the CEO of IT School Innovation. ‘It’s not surprising this kind of technology and associated application would be developed in South Africa — where the use of mobile handsets is widespread and bandwidth adequate and affordable in comparison to fixed line options,†he says. ‘Almost everyone has a handset in South Africa — and the opportunities for education are immense,†he continues.
Mobi currently offers both mathematics education in the form of a five section structured educational approach and secure private chat rooms for learners to communicate with their friends.
Content preparation for other subjects such as physics and chemistry is in progress,†says Liebenberg.
‘Although full use of Mobi maths is charged at a nominal monthly fee of R30 per user, access to some sections of Mobi maths content such as the ‘basic skills’ section is free,†says Kathy Kendall, IT School Innovation’s marketing director.
‘We are acutely aware of the fact that extra tutoring is expensive, so we developed Mobi with affordability in mind,†she says.
English and Afrikaans versions of the Mobi application are available for download free of charge at www.mymobi.co.za/download. It can also be accessed from a PC at www.mymobi.co.za. — the Teacher reporter
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