Sealund’s Serious Games Blog

Mobile Learning technology has matured beyond the “wow” factor to the point where it can be fully integrated with your LMS and deliver content in truly engaging formats, with interactivity including simulations and games, and assess comprehension.

Still, you may ask whether the cost of formatting and delivering courseware through mobile devices is worth it. If we can push entire courses and updates to employees’ desktops, laptops, and Web books, don’t those get the job done well enough? The answer, of course, is that for many types of content, yes, they do. You have to consider the cost of the media of any knowledge transfer experience in relation to the purpose and value of the learning outcome.

For your highest-value learning outcomes, when the type of information and skills you need employees to mobile media is a great solution… Another example is field employees such as sales and service teams, where customer-interaction simulations can deliver:

• New and updated product and pricing information
• Customer service alerts
• Just in time solutions to the field

With content templates and learning engines in the hands of content experts and instructional designers, you can deliver soundly constructed learning experiences for the latest information and skills to your employees more quickly and more effectively than ever. The power of mLearning works amazingly well with the way our brains are wired for learning, particularly for things we need to apply right away and want to develop into habits.

Immediacy, Just-in-Time

Even traditional classroom learning has scheduled course delivery based on the just-in-time principle. eLearning has been able to push delivery closer to the critical application time. But mLearning tools put the “media” in immediacy for just-in-time, at-your-fingertips learning experiences. A simulation with a video demo of a new product or of a product defect being fixed, along with an avatar-driven simulation to model your employee’s related customer interaction, engages employees in learning not only the facts but the interpersonal skills for using those facts most effectively. It’s all about engagement in the learning experience when you most need success in the learning outcome.

Iterative Reinforcement

Sure, immediately applying something you just learned about is a rush, but what about those good habits you really want to develop … but keep forgetting to act on? Send in the reinforcements - mLearning to the rescue!

mLearning can push timely reinforcements in interactive formats to your employees-for example, games or simulations or videos rather than calendar reminders-and for behaviors that show your employees you care about them as well as about your customers. You can send a work-specific skill refreshing simulation or game related to instructor-led or eLearning experiences they had the day, the week, or the month before. You can also show employees you care about their well-being with a video of stretches to do at your desk or in an airplane seat, or a simulation for selecting healthy lunch options on-the-go, or eye-refocusing graphics to prevent optical strain, or a brain-teaser game to kick-start creativity.

…And They Like It

The iPass March, 2010 Mobile Workforce Report on “Employee Device Preference” showed that 63% of respondents required WiFi to keep on top of business activities, and in-flight, where 96.1% preferred a Wi-Fi-enabled laptop, 32% would most often use their smartphone, “showing a trend to dual device needs.” It’s no surprise that a growing number of business travelers turn to their smartphones for work-related tasks because it’s so much more efficient than finding a WiFi hotspot and booting up their laptop computers. They can engage with smartphone-based learning, among other business activities, whether they’re in a lobby waiting to see a customer, or standing in line for lunch, or on a commuter train work- or homeward-bound.

You know the leadership truism - It’s easier to lead in the direction they want to go anyway. And smartphones and other mobile devices are certainly that direction. Turns out, those smartphones can help make their users smart, too!

Because our clients and their employees are so smart, Sealund’s mTeam is developing custom mLearning applications and introducing m-Learning versions of our existing courseware, based on our new mLearning Methodology to ensure learners of the instructional soundness for which Sealund & Associates has earned recognition since introducing our eLearning methodology in 1985. Our M-Learning Methodology supports rapid prototyping for a variety of mobile platforms.

Our new mLearning apps for your iPhone, Android, and Blackberry include:

• Alaris™ Financial Literacy Curricula’s “Reducing and Eliminating Debt” curriculum that’s so in-demand for its original platform. The mLearning version includes rich graphics on every screen as the mentor walks learners through the effective strategies and habits, and another avatar engages learners in a relatable story to practice those habits and strategies. It also provides an interactive calculator for instant and repeated application and reinforcement of new skills.
• The Smart Shopper’s tool that helps you calculate the real cost of big-ticket items by factoring in the interest you’ll pay at the rate and number of months you enter.

What do you think? Please share your comments.

This entry was posted on Friday, June 4th, 2010 at 1:16 pm and is filed under Serious Games. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.