Abstract:

Ubiquitous informatics blurs educational spaces and times, creates new learning resources and opportunities. The learning process is not exclusive to the room but goes beyond its limits.
In this context arises a new way of learning, the u-learning, characterized by a set of formative activities, accessible anywhere and from any device, stimulating the development of the competencies the present world demands.
This paper aims to present the analysis of the results obtained from applying a model of ubiquitous learning adjusted to the university context as a guide for designing teacher training proposals and to show the improvement of the model out of the inclusion of a socio-cultural perspective.
Framed within the “Ubiquitous informatics: its application in the university context” Research Project developed in the Faculty of Exact Sciences and Technologies of the National University of Santiago del Estero, a ubiquitous learning environment model adjusted to the university context was designed from a systemic approach.
In the model the characteristics of u-learning, i.e. permanency, accessibility, immediacy, interactivity, and context-awareness are considered.
In a ubiquitous learning environment, mediation among the participants of the process occurs through the pedagogical dialogue supported by ubiquitous informatics.
The model was used as a guide for designing teacher training courses. Their implementation was assessed by surveys among the participants and the analysis and observation of the pedagogic proposals presented as their final works.
The end of course work consisted of designing a proposal for a subject matter using the so-called Learning through Projects Teaching Strategy that is related to “learning within and outside the room, all the time”, that is, to ubiquitous learning. In this stage, drawbacks appeared, for example, in positing problematic situations, in the switch of the teaching role, in the collaborative working, in the achievement of innovating proposals instead of mere technological ones among others. This unveiled that teachers should also be ubiquitous students and that the model needed to be adjusted.
The ubiquitous learning is situated, contextual, and incorporated to daily life as much the same it is posited by social constructivism. The Zone of Proximal Development concept is incorporated to the core element of the model, the “student”, and to the relationships among the various elements comprising the ubiquitous learning environment. Additionally, the design of activities that conjugate research, discussion, practice, collaboration and production along the learning process is proposed.
First the original ubiquitous learning environment model utilized as guide for designing training is introduced. Then the results that give rise to the proposal are analyzed. Later the main concepts of the Vigotsky’s theory, in particular the zone of proximal development, guiding the preliminary adjustment of the model are established. At last, the conclusions highlighting the convenience of considering the socio-cultural perspective within a ubiquitous learning model supported by ubiquitous informatics that goes beyond the mere technological issue are stated and the future working lines of work are suggested as well.

Keywords:

ubiquitous learning, Sociocultural learning theory, model, ubiquitous computing, online teacher education