Friday, February 27, 2009

Children’s Use of Mobile Phones – An International Comparison

worth a read

Children’s Use of Mobile Phones – An International Comparison
To gain a better understanding of how children use their mobile phones across the world, the GSMA has collaborated with NTT DoCoMo on research comparing children’s use of mobile phones. The report “Children’s Use of Mobile Phones – An International Comparison” was published in February 2009 with NTT DoCoMo’s Mobile Society Research Institute (MSRI), with support from KT Freetel (KTF). It compares mobile phone use by children in five countries - Japan, Korea, China, India and Mexico.
Over 6,000 children between the ages of 9 and 18 and their parents were surveyed on a range of questions on their use, attitudes and feelings towards mobile phones.

Whilst the main factor affecting children’s mobile phone ownership is their age (for each additional year in age, an additional 4% of children own a mobile phone), the network effect of friends starting to use mobile phones was also found to be a key trigger for take up of phones by children across all the countries surveyed.

Gender, parental age, parental income and ownership of video games and computers were also found to have an effect on ownership of phones across all the surveyed countries.
Gender - 4% more girls owned a mobile phone than boys, and 9% more girls who did not own a mobile phone wanted to.

  • Parental age - the older the parents, the older the children are when they first start to own mobile phones.
  • Computers and video games - children owning personal computers and video games are more likely to own mobile phones and start using them at an earlier age.
  • Parental Income – the higher their parents’ income, the more likely children are to own a mobile phone.
  • Contrary to theories that mobile phones can be an unwelcome distraction for children, the study found no effective correlation between children’s ownership and usage of mobile phones and the time they spent on other activities.

The study also examined children’s attitudes to mobile phones and the ways in which mobiles may influence them. It found that girls, more than boys, view their phones as essential tools in their lives and that children who use mobile e-mail/SMS more frequently tend to show higher levels of trust in new media such as the Internet and slightly reduced trust in traditional media including TV and newspapers.

The full report can be downloaded from the GSMA website at http://www.gsmworld.com/documents/Final_report.pdf

texting improves language skills

Now this is one to get people rant and raving but read the piece and make your own mind up ! http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/7910075.stm

the team at Coventry have got more work in this area they are working on .

Thursday, February 26, 2009

Emerging technology all about micro blogging

Resisted the cheesy emerging tech all a twitter about twitter because that isn't what the piece is about http://emergingtechnologies.becta.org.uk/index.php?section=etn&rid=14363

Also worth feeding the rss feeds into your feed reader of choice
The first one covers all postings the subsequent ones specific interest area


Wednesday, February 25, 2009

Learning Lab free TXT in education event

other technologies products are available ;-) Now I myself am on jury service but a chance to see Mike Short of O2 do a keynotes got to be worth a shot and its free.

Learning Lab and Edutxt are pleased to announce its one day conference at Priorslee Hall, Telford at the Shropshire Campus of the University of Wolverhampton.

Every student and 98% of parents have a mobile phone capable of sending and receiving SMS text messages. It is undeniably socially and digitally inclusive. Desktop SMS is now being used in hundreds of Universities, Colleges and Schools. This is your opportunity to find out from peers why.

This one day FREE* event is designed to give you an insight into how colleges and universities are utilising this simple technology to dramatically improve the way they communicate with their students and peers.

Learn from people who have been using this technology every day for years Experience practical case examples delivered by users
Understand how you will improve your service to students

Keynote by Mike Short, Vice President of Research and Development O2 register for your FREE* place now at:

Web: http://www.learninglab.org.uk


alternatve link and details here

Stimulus Package to Quickly Impact Education Technology

Use of exisiting edtech programme is interesting in US stimulus package. Looks like workforce development gets a bit of a plug. Thanks to Bob (think about learning not buildings) Harrison for sending this my way I know hes got things to say on the subject but whats your view !!

Thursday, February 19, 2009

Shape Collage - Free Automatic Photo Collage Maker

Photos on flickr make a stunning photo collage. Very very neat of
biking with family in peak district promise to make a phto collage of
the trip . Have a look.

http://www.vincentcheung.ca/shapecollage/

Sunday, February 15, 2009

Digital Information Fluency Model

httpInteresting piece worth a read do you agree ?http://21cif.com/resources/difcore/index.html

Thursday, February 12, 2009

4 Billion Connections !

Thats an awful lots of communication going. Thats the figure from Wireless Intelligence the GSMA's market intelligence unit even more scary is 6 billion connections by 2013.

Read more at http://www.gsmworld.com/newsroom/press-releases/2009/2521.htm

4 Billion Connections !

Thats an awful lots of communication going. Thats the figure from Wirelss Intelligence the GSMA's market intelligence unit even more scary is 6 billion connections by 2013.

Read more at http://www.gsmworld.com/newsroom/press-releases/2009/2521.htm

O2 announces free internet safety book for UK schools

Interesting development and showing a nice degree of corporate responsibility. Just have a look.

O2 announces free internet safety book for UK schools







Written
by best selling children’s authors Steve Barlow and Steve
Skidmore, ‘Who wnts 2 no?’ helps advise children how to
stay safe online.


As part of European Safer Internet day, O2 in conjunction with
Childnet International has announced the publication of ‘who wnts
2 no?’, a children’s story on internet safety. The book for
8-12 year olds was jointly written by best selling children’s
authors Steve Barlow and Steve Skidmore. It will be published on 5th
March and is free to schools and libraries which can order copies from
today.  They can order copies, plus promotional posters and
stickers, at www.o2.com/thecybernuts.


‘Who wnts 2 no?’ is a story about 3 school friends Dud,
Zip and Mouse, together known as the Cybernuts. Dud thinks he has found
a foolproof way of getting rich quick by giving away his personal
details online. Zip and Mouse aren’t convinced. The book has been
written to inspire children to read for enjoyment but also contains a
more serious message that whilst the online world can bring benefits
children can be at risk from unwanted contact, inappropriate behaviour
and potentially harmful content.


Steve Barlow one of the book’s authors said “We had
a brief to alert kids to the need to use the internet and mobile phones
safely, but we didn’t want to be preachy or doom-laden: we also
wanted to write a good story which would be fun to read. We hope, with
the excellent illustrations of the inestimable Geo Parkin, that
we’ve managed to achieve all that.

Saturday, February 07, 2009

Texting changes young peoples door bell ringing digit preferences and other interesting tech facts

Text is changing the way we physically do things not just how we communicate.


"Ask anyone over 25 what digit they use to ring a doorbell and most people will pop up their index finger.
But ask a youngster and they are much more likely to extend a thumb"

other intresting stuff in CES report 63% of computers sold in the US will be mobile .

Sales of netbooks will double from 10 to 20 million .

Go on have a read http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/7822564.stm


Friday, February 06, 2009

CoSN 2009 Annual Conference

Sadly being Austin Texas I cant make this but looking at the line up looks good. I met Keith Krueger CEO of COSN at BETT and we talked about the conference.Leadership, Policy & Innovation in a Collaborative World. The tile seems a good one

CoSN's 8th Annual International Symposium

Does Web 2.0 Belong in Schools? Policy Issues and Leadership Challenges


March 10-12, 2009







Join
your community of national educational technology leaders, enhance your
career, and define the future of the Internet and information
technologies in our nation’s schools at CoSN’s 2009 Annual
Conference in beautiful Austin, Texas.


Each year the
Consortium for School Networking (CoSN) holds the premier national
technology leadership conference, dedicated to policy and effective
implementation from school district, state, and national perspectives.
The conference attracts over 1,000 district, state, and national
education technology leaders.




March 10, 2009



Any has got a roving correspondent at the event Steve (codename ferret) and hopes to recieve regular updates . So hopefully I will keep you posted. Any how have alook at the conference programme brochure.

Wednesday, February 04, 2009

Becta Emerging Techology New web area

excuse the work related post but this might be of interest to regular readers


Becta are pleased to announce the launch of a new Emerging technology area on the Becta website.

At http://www.becta.org.uk/emergingtechnologies
you will find:
  • articles from the Emerging Technologies for Learning series (with a new article published each month)
  • TechNews – with new content each week
  • key technology trends
  • technology research from Becta and elsewhere
  • discussion forums
  • information on events related to emerging technologies.

The area offers new ways of accessing TechNews including RSS feeds and the ability to compile a PDF* document from selectedarticles.

Initial content for the new area is taken
from January 2009 and previous TechNews issues but, from now on content will
appear on the Emerging technology area ahead of the pdf download version being
available.


You can propose research and events for
possible inclusion on the area, and we’re also keen to hear from you if
you have other suggestions or feedback. Via the website.


Please can you distribute this to your own networks


Monday, February 02, 2009

postive Ofsted report on ICT in colleges

Well done you college types !

"This report examines factors that enable post-16 learners to make good
progress in the sector subject area of information and communication
technology. Between October 2007 and March 2008, inspectors visited 25
colleges where provision in information and communication technologies
had been judged to be good or outstanding at their most recent
inspection. The report has examples of good practice and
recommendations for further improvement."

see the report download page here