Mobile learning apps and students, they exist like the original odd couple.

On one hand you have the app, trendy, cool, ever evolving and students just love them. On the other hand you have exams, study and lots of learning; things that students are not so fond of. However, for some strange reason, when we combine the two, students become a lot more receptive and even more willing to learn. Success!

When we talk about mobile learning apps or m-learning, we mean learning that is done through portable devices such as smartphones and tablets. Mobile learning is one of the hot educational trends for years we are embracing that. Mobile Learning market is estimated to grow over 20 billion USD globally in 2020. If like me you love statistics and figures, (come on everyone loves a good statistic) you are going to love this blog so keep reading.

Why mobile learning?

Historically, access for teachers and students in some countries to ICT has been limited. This posed a major barrier to the advancement of education. Now however, the mobile, cellular or smartphone is changing that reality.

There are currently almost 7 billion mobile phones in the world, almost as many inhabitants as on the planet.

This opens up numerous possibilities for the advancement of education and learning. Did you know that in the city of Lahore, Pakistan, UNESCO run a project where they use SMS texts to distribute educational content to students in disadvantaged areas? Awesome right! This project seeks to help students retain and strengthen their new literacy skills, which are usually stunted if there is not constant practice.

85% of ‘generation Z’ in the United Kingdom (those aged 16 to 24) now own smartphones. Turkey has a shocking 97.6 mobile penetration rate with 77.9 million mobile subscribers according to official BTK reports by the en of 2017

This example is just the tip of the iceberg and focuses heavily on disadvantaged areas. There are also far more intricate ways to deliver education to students via mobile applications and mobile optimised websites and that is where the focus of this article lies.

A quick reminder: mobile learning is not intended to be a unique educational method but rather to complement the other areas of your studies such as class/lecture scenarios or learning through computers and virtual classes.

Mobile learning apps are extremely helpful in certain situations, for example, when you need to check a fact or consume small amounts of information at a given time. About three in four (74%) teens aged 12-17 say they access the internet on cell phones, tablets, and other mobile devices. However, if one were to choose between a computer and a mobile phone for researching a subject in depth, mobile learning probably wouldn’t be your best option. The important thing is, therefore, to use the appropriate means at the right time to optimise the way in which you learn.

It’s no surprise to hear that the US tablet market in schools soared by 103% last year and those figures don’t look like they are slowing down.

With the ever-growing rate of smartphone and tablet use amongst children, we decided it was important that we developed our very own Eğitlence mobile learning app. Eğitlence is focused on values education, brain games to help boosting cognitive skills and inspire kids via gamification. It is available on both iOS and Android. The Egitlence mobile learning app will be the perfect complement to keep children safe from hazards of accessing internet on early ages and help learning while playing games.

But wait, there’s more

We all know that any great mobile learning app will let you travel on-the-go. However, there are many other ways to take advantage of your device from an educational point of view. Here are some of those ideas:

DodoTV: When your kid watches movies in DodoTV, you are ensured that every video is already watched and approved by the specialists and pedagogs. Unlike YouTube there is no chance bad examples or advertisements may show up.

Games and School: Gamified brain training apps monitor cognitive skills and can be seen in parent app to see the progress kid has shown and the percentiles of achievement in her/his age group. While monitoring 5 basic cognitive skill and competitive rank of your kid, you may expect a raise in attention ability and ambition for success.

Monitoring : There are numerous ways in the app parent may interact with their kids even when they are away, see logs what kids are doing and set limits of usage time and durations to keep the technology exposure at the safe levels on children.

One of the highlights of mobile learning apps is that it encourages self-learning. These handy little downloads provide a range of possibilities that allow for learning outside the classroom.

At FYK Technology we believe that mobile learning is the future and we are willing to bet on it with our new app for iOS and Android. What do you think? Are you already engaged in mobile learning?