The integration of cell phone technology and poll everywhere as teaching and learning tools into the school History classroom
Abstract
In recent years there has been a growing amount of research concerned with
integrating mobile technologies for teaching and learning purposes. In spite of the
rapid proliferation of the cell phone as an indispensable mobile tool in the lives of
21st century teachers and learners, it remains a banned item in many schools and
(History) classrooms. As a result cell phone technology, such as its Short Message
Service (SMS) texting function in combination with the Audience Response System
(ARS), Poll Everywhere, has not been extensively explored as teaching and learning
tools in the school classroom.
The purpose of this article is to, through a small scale pilot study, explore and
assess how the ARS, Poll Everywhere (www.polleverywhere.com), which is based
on the cell phone’s SMS function, can be integrated into History lessons to support
and enhance the teaching and learning experience of secondary school learners.
The article furthermore aims to establish the perceptions and attitudes of History
learners (n=52), as well as the experience of the teacher after having had a firsttime
opportunity to integrate SMS technology and Poll Everywhere into their
lessons.
The results indicate among others that although most of the participants
singled out data charges as the biggest possible hindrance to its utilisation, the
overwhelming majority had positive perception levels about the integration of cell
phone technology and the Poll Everywhere application into their History class. The
experiences of the teacher who presented the lessons were positive as well as negative
in nature.
URI
http://hdl.handle.net/10394/14371http://www.sashtw.org.za/index2.htm] [http://dspace.nwu.ac.za/handle/10394/5126