5.3: Revolutionizing Learning in Developing Countries
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Further studies are painting a picture of today’s youth becoming increasingly comfortable and accepting of their new digital lifestyles, powered by always-on technology such as mobile phones, enriched by portable entertainment devices such as iPods, digital cameras, Sony PSPs, and Nintendo’s Gameboy. Friendships are made, maintained, and lost online, often in virtual worlds and on social networking sites such as MySpace, Facebook, and Bebo. Much of what we are seeing today—generally out of the classroom but increasingly in it—is technology-driven, but this technology is not universally accessible to all.
In contrast, the living and learning environments in developing countries can often be quite different. Where mobile technology may prove a complementary extension to teaching methods in the West, for example, improving or enriching the learning experience, in many developing countries it offers the hope of revolutionising learning altogether, even taking it into areas previously starved of reliable or regular education services. This is particularly true in rural areas, which may be characterised by a lack of fixed telephone lines, poor roads and unreliable electricity, poor postal services, few if any personal computers, few teachers, and most likely no Internet access.
What many of these communities will have, however, is mobile network coverage and, if not their own phones, at least access to one. Learning by distance is nothing new in many developing countries, and the mobile phone has the potential to unlock it yet further, expanding its reach and delivering richer, more appropriate, more engaging and interactive content.
But despite the promise, problems remain. Imagine two mobile phone users. One lives in the land of plenty, and owns an iPhone. He or she can access the Internet via free wireless connections dotted around the city, download and play games, keep in contact with friends and family via instant messenger (IM), watch streaming video and live TV, and use as much data, SMS or voice, as they like with a cheap all-inclusive price plan. The other lives in the land of less. He or she uses a shared phone, lives in an area not covered by a data network of any kind, has a sporadic signal, a phone incapable of playing games or video, and has to think twice before sending an SMS or making a voice call because of constant concerns over airtime credit, not to mention worries over how the phone will be recharged if the main electricity doesn’t come back for days.
“Teachers open the door, but you must enter by yourself”. – Chinese proverb