Location-based Learning–Simple to Sophisticated

While there is always a lot of buzz about stophisticated, multi-media, interactive Location-based Learning apps for smartphones; there are a plethora of simple text or audio Location-based Learning products and services for basic or feature phones around the world.

In remote locations such as the Uganda Kabale agricultural district, farmers are in desperate need of up-to-date information about weather patterns, pests, and planting times. The Life Long Learning for Farmers in Uganda (L3F Uganda) project sends text and voice messages to 1000 farmers’ mobile phones. More than 75% of farmers in the project’s pilot area own mobile phones.

The L3F Uganda project is a partnership between Makerere University’s Agricultural Research Institute Kabanyolo, local community organizations, and The Commonwealth of Learning (COL). COL is an intergovernmental organization whose mission is to encourage the development and sharing of open learning/distance education knowledge, resources and technologies. “Commercial banks are also encouraged to provide loans to farmers who have increased their knowledge, capacity, and productivity thanks to information from the consortium and ICT (information and communication technologies) kiosks.”

In the US, the National Healthy Mothers, Healthy Babies Coalition (HMHB) launched Text4Baby in 2010 as an effort to help pregnant women and new mothers get information about caring for their health and their children’s. The program is supported by CTIA – The Wireless Foundation, 18 mobile carriers, and 1000 partners. Johnson & Johnson was the founding sponsor. Since launch on February 10, 2010, the texting service has been used by over 550,000 English and Spanish speakers.

Text4Baby is one of the few Mobile Learning value added services (VAS) in the US, so far. The Africa, Asia, and Latin America regions are experiencing an explosion of VAS. The popularity of the Text4Baby program demonstrates the untapped opportunity for VAS in the US.

More about Location-based Learning http://ambientinsight.com/Reports/LocationBasedLearning.aspx.