Research Centre for Technology Enhanced Learning

MLEARN international conferences

The annual international mobile learning conference MLEARN was the first conference to focus exclusively on Mobile Learning. Now in its 7th year MLEARN is widely recognised as one of the most prestigious international conferences in the field.

Members of the TEL Research Centre team contributed to the first MLEARN conference at Birmingham University in 2002.

LSDA hosted, and Jill Attewell co-chaired, MLEARN 2003 in London (download the book of conference papers).

The TEL team also helped to organise, and Jill co-chaired, MLEARN 2004 in Rome (download the book of conference papers).

LSDA/LSN TEL team colleagues have been served on Programme committees and contributed to all the subsequent MLEARN conferences i.e:

MLEARN 2005, Cape Town, 24-28 October 2005 (PDF versions of all full papers presented can be found at www.mlearn.org.za/papers-full.html)

MLEARN 2006, Banff, Canada, 20-26 October 2006.

MLEARN 2007 , Melbourne, Australia 16-19 October 2007

The next MLEARN Conference, MLEARN 2008, will be in Iron Bridge in the UK from 7th to 10th October 2008 and is followed by Handheld Learning 2008 in London, 13-15 October and a single ticket to attend both events is available at an advantageous price.

The International Association for Mobile Learning (IAMLearn)

At the MLEARN 2007 conference in Melbourne in October 2007, the International Association for Mobile Learning (IAMLearn) was inaugurated with the aim of providing a professional association for researchers and practitioners, to promote excellence in research, development and application of mobile learning.

The Association is registered as a not for profit company in South Africa and the founding committee comprises the Chairs of previous MLEARN conferences, which have been held in Birmingham, London, Rome, Cape Town, Banff and Melbourne, and the 2008 conference which will take place in Ironbridge in the UK (see www.mlearn2008.org/).

Jill Attewell, Manager of LSN’s Technology Enhanced Learning Research Centre has been elected as the founding Vice President of IAMLearn. The founding President is Professor Mike Sharples, Director, Learning Sciences Research Institute University of Nottingham. Committee positions will be open for re-election at MLEARN 2008. A draft constitution was presented at the founding meeting and this will be revised during the coming weeks.

Although the Association was born at the MLEARN conference, the intention is for it to be an inclusive organisation. One task for the coming year is to engage mobile learning researchers in a discussion on how to manage the rapid growth in the field and to bring some coordination to the growing number of conferences and journals in the area of mobile, handheld and pervasive learning.

A temporary website for the IAMLearn can be found at www.iamlearn.caryloliver.com/ and visitors can register their interest in joining the association. www.iamlearn.org will become the address of the association soon. Benefits of membership will include reduction in registration fees at the MLEARN and Online Educa conferences and deals will be negotiated with other conference organisers.