YoungJun Lee, HeonChang Yu,

Bokyung Kye, Jaehyeok Choi

With the recent fast development of information and communication technology and the advent of ubiquitous society, education paradigm shift is inevitable for upbringing leaders of future society and improving the national competitiveness. U-learning becomes an important strategy and the developments of suitable teaching and learning strategies, infrastructures, ubiquitous learning devices and educational contents are urgently required.

In this research, therefore, we developed teaching & learning scenarios in U-learning environment and defined essential functions and specifications for ubiquitous learning devices. We, also, present the prospect of ubiquitous learning devices according to the development stages of U-learning technology.

The contents of this study are summarized as follows.

A. Analysis of existing portable devices

We analyzed characteristics of existing portable devices(Tablet PC, PDA, cellular phone, PMP, and UMPC etc.) and educational usage of these devices. Because existing portable learning devices are not specialized for educational purpose, they limitedly support various learning activities. Moreover, learners easily divert their attentions to entertainment functions of those devices. Also, those devices are expensive and are developed without consideration of physical and mental development stages of students. Therefore, learners may have difficulties in using the devices and feel inconvenience. It is required to develop new devices that overcome shortcomings of existing personal portable devices. New devices should have improved portability, economical efficiency and improved learning effect.  They also have a function to block activities that are not related with learning.

B. Analysis of consumers' demands in the development of ubiquitous learning devices

We have surveyed parents, teachers and students in elementary and secondary schools on the existing portable devices' applications and their demands for next generation learning devices. Survey results are as follows. Existing personal portable devices is very expensive. Tablet PC is inconvenient to carry and its battery life is too short. PDA is difficult to use. Cellular phone screen is very small. Battery life of UMPC is short and UMPC is difficult to use. Students use devices less than an hour every day. Middle- and high-school students replied that they are having difficulties in concentrating on learning with these devices.

  Their requirements for learning devices are as follows. The size of screen should be from 8.4 to 10.4 inches for elementary students and from 7 to 8.4 inches for secondary students. Battery life should be from 3 to 5 hours for elementary and more than 8 hours for high school students. Elementary school students prefer a stylish pen, external keyboard and speech recognition device and secondary school students prefer a stylish pen, internal keyboard and touch screen. Parents and teachers are interested in excluding poisonous information and uninstructive functions.

C. Educational plans using learning devices

Through this study, we proposed educational scenarios in which ubiquitous learning devices are used. We discussed educational effects of ubiquitous learning devices. Scenarios are developed according to  U-learning development stages. Our proposed scenarios are shown as integrated learning forms that can be applied to all schools. The scenarios are presented according to viewpoints of students, teachers, and parents. 

D. Essential functions and specifications of ubiquitous learning devices

Based on previous analysis, we specified essential functions and specifications. We proposed functions for teaching and learning as well as hardware and software functions. Also we proposed solutions to each function. Essential functions and specifications are summarized as follows.

  Ubiquitous learning devices should have high resolution screens(more than 1024x768 pixels), Wi-Fi, dual camera, touch screen, stylish pen, user-defined buttons for the learners' convenience. They should support multi booting mode, fingerprint recognition for security and loss prevention. Their softwares should include multimedia data processing(audio, image etc) software, word processor, e-note, e-dictionary, and e-book viewer, etc. Ubiquitous learning devices should support management of learning plan, history of learning, learner, and teaching & learning activities. They also should provide blocking function for uninstructive information.

E. Development prospects of ubiquitous learning devices

We present prospects for the development of ubiquitous learning devices according to developmental stage of U-learning technology.  Technology developments of sensors, human interfaces, computing devices and applications are studied. We prospect educational supporting services such as learner management, learning contents, data creation and sharing, learning evaluation, learning control & blocking, and other informations, etc. We present prospects on the development of ubiquitous learning technologies and detailed specification of ubiquitous learning devices.