Unlocking the Potential of Wireless Learning

Wirelessly enabled learning offers distinctive benefits to teaching and learning because of portability, low cost and improved communication capabilities (Kukulska-Hulme & Traxler, 2005). This article presents an exploratory review of several categories of wireless technologies, their successful applications in higher education institutions and challenges from the educator’s perspective. Recent research reports a diverse range of wireless learning strategies, see for example Parsons et al. (2006), and current applications of wireless technologies in teaching are still emerging. Conclusions drawn from successful experiments using mobile devices and wireless networks in universities may inspire others and help reassess the challenges ahead. Further studies are needed to explore and successfully apply wireless capabilities driven by the pedagogy, rather than the technology. This paper attempts to outline various teaching strategies and relevant categories of wireless applications focusing on the relationship between the pedagogy and the supporting technology. It concludes with suggesting issues for further research, especially the need to thoroughly evaluate the learning benefits of wireless applications