Responsibility Blog

Delivering Educational Content via Mobile Phones

By Jennifer Fritschi | September 25, 2009

I recently ran across this video from Frontline’s Digital Nation. In it, Secretary of Education Arne Duncan talks about innovative ways to make use of mobile phones to teach kids.

He makes a great point and asks a compelling question: Kids use their phones constantly, and the phones these days are powerful computing devices. Why not use them to deliver educational content?

In my job overseeing the Verizon Thinkfinity Professional Development Program, I track broad educational trends such as this one. I can say that yes, there is much debate in the educational community about use of cell phones in the classroom, as outlined in these stories from Science Daily, the New York Times, and KXnet.com. [Update, Oct. 2: I’ve updated these links.]

Although the opinion still varies as to the appropriateness of mobile phones in the classroom, I’ve seen a shift moving from “to be or not to be” in the classroom to a discussion on the myriad of ways cell phone can help support 21st Century teaching and learning. The education vendors are certainly stepping up to the plate and beginning to diversify their content delivery to include mobile devices. And yes, we’re working to improve our offerings in this area as well.