Interactive learning using mobile devices to enhance Healthcare practice education

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Interactive learning using mobile devices to
enhance Healthcare practice education

• Jill Taylor, Catherine Coates, Sara Eastburn,
  Ieuan Ellis

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Aims of the Pilot

• Integrate mobile technologies into placement
  activities to include both dietetics and
  physiotherapy pre-registration students.
• Evaluate the usability of mobile technology with
  both staff and students.
• Deliver an enhanced student experience whilst on
  practice placement.
• Evaluate the effectiveness of the mobile
  technology in supporting assessment, learning and
  teaching activities.
• Define the ethical and data protection issues
  associated with the use of mobile devices in
  practice settings to support ALT.

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Pilot Groups Players

• 20 MSc Physiotherapy (pre-registration) students
• Five week placement
• 5 university tutors
• supporting formative clinical debriefing session
• support summative assessment for Integrated
  Practice

• 26 BSc Dietetic (pre-registration) students
• Twelve week placement
• 4 university tutors and 2 link tutors
• 10 students PDAs and 16PCs
• support the summative assessment for Reflection
  and Consolidation of Practice module

• Learning activities
• log of pivotal incidents that support critical
  analysis higher level thinking
• opportunity for inter-professional interaction to
  enhance inter-professional and collaborative
  working
• support reflective and reflexive learning
  experiences

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The Kit

• Ethics
• Student proforma
• Letter to clinical assessors
• Hardware O2 XDA Mini-S
• Support Training
• Training sessions mediaBoard CCS
• WebCT module documentation surveys
• CCS support telephone support
• Software mediaBoard
• Build web-based multimedia message boards, add
  comments using SMS (text) or MMS from a mobile
  phone (picture) or by Email or web access

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mediaBoard
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mediaBoard examples
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Evaluation Strategy

• Three key questions addressed
• What is the experience of learners and
  practitioners?
• Did it improve the student experience?
• Did it improve their knowledge and skills?
• What use was made of it to enrich ALT?
• Was it integrated into the assessment?
• How well learners understood the intended aims?
• Did they benefit in expected and unexpected ways?
• Were there enhancements to teaching and learning?
• How easy is it to use and implement?
• What problems were encountered.

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Data Collection Capture

• Students
• Pre and post WebCT survey
• Focus groups
• mediaBoard student issues evaluation
• Staff
• Pre and post WebCT survey
• Focus groups
• mediaBoard staff issues

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Students Pre-survey
Which mobile devices do you own?
Who is your contract with?
Which of the following do you have on your mobile
device?
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Students Pre-survey
How confident are you at using a mobile phone?
Which of the following operations are you
confident you can do?
Do you use your mobile device for any of the
following?
How do you feel about being involved in the
mobile pilot?
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Pre-survey Comments
?
?
?
..it will be good to have access all of the time
to share ideas

..this is a great idea
..looking forward to Internet connection on the go
?
.. interested in being able to contact other
students but concerned it will take up too much
time learning about how to use it
?
..worried that it will take more of my time when
Im already going to be stressed with the workload
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Benefits Tutor Peer Support
Has the use of your PDA and/or mediaBoard helped
you in any of the following areas?

• ..useful for contacting visiting tutor at
  university whilst on placement

• ..think the mediaBoard is very clever for
  students to leave messages for others..

• ..useful as we had projects to do together so we
  used it a lot for that

• ..useful to phone Mike because he had done a
  respiratory placement before so when I finished
  at the end of the day I would give him a call and
  get his viewsI found that quite useful

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BenefitsAccessing Recording Information
Has the use of your PDA and/or mediaBoard helped
you in any of the following areas?

• ..if I didnt know something and I was seeing a
  patient I would look up a condition on the
  Internet from my PDA-and that was good

• ..used it heaps and heaps to access information
  because I couldnt access any computers

• .. was staying in Hull in accommodation where you
  dont have internet access so I used it quite a
  bit

• ..being able to take pictures during in-services
  (x-ray for example) acts as a useful trigger for
  recalling information

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Benefits Skills Development

• good for recording data and evaluating and
  reflecting upon clinical experiences

• get more out of it if you record your
  thoughtsespecially for reflective practice

• ..think the audio thing would have been really
  useful for recording reflections ..I think I
  should have used it more

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Issues Ethics Cultural Change
?
?
..sometimes when I was getting shown something on
a patient then that would have been useful but
you cant do it

• ..some people might have thought the money could
  go on better things rather than giving us a phone

 
 
 
 
?
.. explained it to my supervisor but all the
other staff, like psychologists or occupational
therapists, were all looking at me as if to say
Whats she doing on her mobile phone?
My educator said you should use it, youve been
given it, and all the doctors use it so why not
use it? so I dared use it
?
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Issues Time
I would be more motivated to use mediaBoard if I
had more time?

• .. think the mediaBoard could be very useful
  although I didnt have time to use it

• would have used it if I had more time

• ..too much in an already hectic schedule

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Issues Engagement
I would be more motivated to use mediaBoard if
tasks counted towards assessment?
 
 
 
 
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Issues Training Support
Following the training in the use of the PDA I
felt confident in the use of the functions.

• ..give phones out a few days before the training
  to let us play around on them..everyone is too
  bust playing instead of listening

Following the training in the use of mediaBoard I
felt confident in the use of the functions.

• ..I wouldnt have know who to ring..I whould have
  got to them about the mediaBoard thing.. If Id
  have known there was open access to them

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Issues Technical
Which method did you use to enter data?
?
?
..its faffy writing with little pens.. the
slideout keyboard is so small .. you typed slowly
 
 
 
 
..can they speed up the Internet connection?
..a bit bulky to carry around whilst in uniform
?
?
?
?
..the mediaBoard didnt work to start withso
no-one kept doing it
..couldnt send video
..batteries are not very good
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Issues Other
..I dont know if we were supposed to..I used it
to ring ethics boards and RD boards.. I didnt
have to worry about the cost..it takes the stress
away
?
..it got stolen so Id say that was a problem
..it was a kind of responsibility
 
 
 
 
?
..although difficult to come to terms with using
the PDA..I used it extensively..will miss it on
later placements a godsend
And the last word
?
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Tutor Evaluation Ongoing

• ..I can see with more time and commitment I would
  use this more in the future

• Initial feedback
• Communication support facilitated
• Cultural change
• Training
• Time

• ..Great way to access and support students
  directly when on placement

• .. a big cultural change but very interesting and
  great potential to support students

• ..Personally Im not against them but I would
  need much more support/time to learn how to use
  them

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Lessons Learned

• Introduce the technology early in the course to
  encourage familiarity and develop cultural
  acceptance.
• Tasks need to be more directive and embedded in
  the assessment strategy.
• Encourage acceptance by the clinical educators
  and tutors.

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Continuation Ideas

• Build up resource boards prior to and during
  placement.
• Collection of multimedia objects and reflections
  to link with e-portfolios.
• Enhanced use of the communication functions which
  would include more use of the text alert
  function.

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For more information

• mediaBoard websitewww.m-learning.org
• ALPS website www.alps-cetl.ac.uk