Seow Sen Kee, Peter

With the proliferation of mobile computing devices by the current school generation, significant opportunities have emerged for supporting personalized learning experiences through mobile devices. In our pilot study in introducing mobilized curricula to a class, we observed an inspiring mobilized lesson that made the students moved beyond classroom activities and exploited the affordances of mobile learning to provide multiple learning pathways for elementary grade (primary) 2 students. We analyzed how the affordances of mobile computing enable personalized meaningful learning in the lesson from four aspects: (a) allowing multiple entry points and learning pathways, (b) supporting multi-modality, (c) enabling student improvisation in-situ, and (d) supporting the creation and sharing of student artifacts on the move. A key property of mobile technology that enables these affordances lies with the high degree of portability of these devices which make them non-obtrusive in the students' learning spaces. Through the analysis, we hope to inspire the m-learning field to explore further what the affordances of mobile technology can enable in order to inform the design of more effective mobilized lessons.

The purpose of this study is to explore the complex nature of Singapore teachers’ beliefs about knowledge and learning and how these beliefs influence pedagogical practices in their classes. This paper presents findings from a large-scale survey study with 1806 teachers in Singapore. Data revealed that while teachers’ beliefs about pedagogies, knowledge and learning were largely consistent, they also believed and practiced both teacher-centered and learner-centered pedagogies and assessment methods.

Coding for students is no longer just constrained to software and screen-based text and graphics. Students today use programmable sensors and microprocessors to solve the problems around them. The purpose of this research is to understand how students conceptualize problems and implement solutions with physical computing. Our study is driven by the following: 1) find out what Computational Thinking (CT) competencies, specifically abstraction, decomposition and algorithmic thinking, can be developed by students and 2) to what level students develop these competencies in carrying out physical computing projects. We closely observe how 41 Grade 7 students developed solutions for problems they identify in the physical world around them. Through doing so, we explore how powerful ideas of CT play a role in a project-approach to physical computing. We believe open-ended exploration through a project-approach in physical computing should reinforce practices where CT skills can grow and flourish. Our findings show that much of students’ interaction with sensors and devices is at pre-CT level, where students simply use pre-existing code fragments or templates. As students gain skills and confidence, they can be explicitly guided to develop CT skills with new projects of their own design justifying their choices. We strongly believe that Computational Modeling (CM) could help students develop their CT skills e.g. abstraction, decomposition, and algorithmic approach much more than the minimally guided syntax driven teaching approaches.

Schools are implementing 1-to-1 technology programmes to equip students and teachers with personal computing devices for teaching and learning in the classrooms. Despite significant financial investments in starting and maintaining such programmes, the success of 1-to-1 technology programmes depends to a large extent on teachers. As gatekeepers, they decide when and how 1-to-1 technology is actually used in the classroom. The introduction of 1-to-1 technology directly affects the teachers in the classroom and their practice, but the research literature does not adequately address teachers’ experiences in using 1-to-1 technology in their teaching. This phenomenological study examines 6 Singapore teachers’ experiences in integrating 1-to-1 technology into their classrooms, the tensions they faced, and the support they needed in adopting the technology. Maximum variation sampling was used to select participants across a variation of technology devices used, teaching subjects, school types, teaching levels, teaching experiences and experiences in using 1-to-1 technology. Data were collected through a series of in-depth interviews conducted with each participant.

Analysis of the interview data was performed using Van Manen’s recommended Phenomenological methods to examine teachers’ individual and collective experiences. The following themes of teachers’ experiences emerged from the analysis: 1) Developing fluency in the use of 1-to-1 technology with teaching practices; 2); Using 1-to-1 technology for effective teaching; 3) Shifting roles of teaching and learning; and 4) Facing the challenges of using 1-to-1 technology in teaching. The teachers encountered tensions such as meeting curriculum demands in the syllabus with the additional effort and time they require in planning and enacting lessons integrating 1-to-1 technology and handling misuse of technology by students. In facing these tensions, teachers made trade-offs in the use of 1-to-1 technology in their teaching. Teachers valued the collegial support they received from their peers, autonomy support given by school leaders and the technology support from the school. The findings address some of the gaps in the 1-to-1 research literature by providing a richer description of teachers’ use of the technology. Implications for this study are discussed in aligning the use of 1-to-1 technology with effective teaching practices, articulating the conditions for sustaining the use of 1-to-1 technology, and introducing digital citizenship for responsible technology use.

With the prevalence of online communication in recent years, many teacher professional development (TPD) activities occur in blended learning environments which combine face-to-face (FTF) co-located experiences with online experiences. However, many scholars point out that blended learning environments need to be thoughtfully designed in order to integrate FTF learning with online learning experiences, and that there seems to be a lack of designs that pertain specifically to in-service teachers. Professional development is crucial for inservice teachers who are at the forefront of learning and teaching in the classroom. To impact student learning, deepening content knowledge and upgrading pedagogical skills are pivotal to teachers’ professionalism. Building professional development communities through blended learning environments is a core strategy for teachers to grow their professionalism, considering the multitude of demands faced by teachers, especially in Singapore. With the aim of designing more supportive and sustained TPD communities through blended learning environments, we undertook a review of the literature. This review has resulted in a five R conceptual framework. We synthesised from the literature the observation that the design and development of sustained blended TPD communities involve multifaceted and complex issues. Such communities would need to hold strong relevance for their members, encourage close relations between members, enable rich reifications of artefacts, be well recognised by important stakeholders, and lastly, be equipped with structural, digital, and human resources.

This study investigates how underserved children in the community develop Computational Thinking skills through learning physical computing with the support from older tutor volunteers. The children learned to construct physical computing projects by learning to code the micro:bit, and using various input sensors and controlling output devices. We observed the students and their interaction with the mentors to understand how they develop their Computational Thinking skills as they construct the projects. From our findings, learning with tutors can provide the support in developing Computational Thinking skills in the children.

Learning is interweaved into and across students’ everyday life activities. Technology that is used to support learning should be integrated with everyday life in the same way that learning occurs in everyday life: seamlessly. Mobile technologies, with their reduced size and ease of use, provide the potential to extend students’ learning spaces and enrich the learning experiences in their daily lives where they move between locations, switch from one topic or context to another, and interact with different social groups. This paper proposes mobile technology-supported seamless learning and presents learning scenarios from our research to illustrate how learning occurs seamlessly across time and places mediated by mobile devices.

The use of mobile technology can help extend children's learning spaces and enrich the learning experiences in their everyday lives where they move from one context to another, switching locations, social groups, technologies, and topics. When students have ubiquitous access to mobile devices with full connectivity, the in-situ use of the mobile devices in different contexts may allow students to make connections to what they learn in the classroom with their daily life experiences outside the classroom. This article proposes mobile technology supported seamless learning to illustrate how learning occurs seamlessly across time and places mediated by mobile devices. The authors' approaches to nurturing a seamless learning environment are also discussed.