First the Website - then the LMS

Creating the material in a website format was only step one, restricting it to be a "phone" view website and link it to Lyn's weekly email assignments was quite different as the students then were directed to Mahara's e portfolio non-school related freeware - foliofor.me ( http://foliofor.me/ ) to create a personal account or to About.me for the next step - the creating a portfolio or bio.

Although my hiccup with Moodle proved to cost me time and my original plan, the beta testing using the website alternative was great experience in redoing a plan based on learner's habits. Accessing my assignment by way of an email sent to their phones, the majority of students then accessed the website by their cellphone and could build their portfolios or bios by way of the links with their phones too. I was impressed. However, for those not enrolled in Lyn's course/my beta test group, you can only see this material in pieces - website then find foliofor.me on your own...

But it gave me great sense of social communication as alternatives for developing course project materials for the "cellphone" learning generation. I also see this over previous methods of using PowerPoint or Prezi for online lectures or material that the students usually skip or never review due to it not "fitting" on their phones.

I even motivated Lyn to consider a few of her "original lecture- ideas" and project assignments to be moved into a similar use of a website overview of a topic, then linked to an actual project using a cellphone as the "computer". By doing this, it allows her to keep ownership of her course based materials and gives her students a take-away product, not tied to the college student accounts or Blackboard passwords, yet easy to show on their phones.

Most loved that their portfolios or bios were linkable to their Facebook or other social media too...that was biggest comment...I am now moving onto other people I know professionally or socially in LinkedIn to try out my email based course or to view the website course on their cellphones or tablets for feedback. Longer term, I want to find out how to host it all together on VoiceThread (which costs)  as a total three part course and allows discussion boards and galleries for students to share projects views. I am working on my Learnest version, but wanted to make sure I made the deadlines with my first test of this idea.

In my research in a number of classes, I have kept coming back to cellphones for educational use in courses for third world countries or places where access to computers is limited, but never thought about developing my materials for delivery onto cellphones, then computers. How you develop, write, and design is very different. Can't be too wordy - must have clear narrative, build upon previous topic, be organized, and most of all be bite sized- to the point seconds.

None are my best qualities ...but I believe that cellphone course designs are important to us all to have in mind when developing materials - as one of the learners told me, "who has time?" Condensing my material was hard. But the course runs fast...and within thirty minutes, the learner has a portfolio started or /and a bio too that they can link anywhere, all from their cellphone.