For several years, I have purchased a notebook computer for each new teacher to the program. As they return for a second year, I purchase digital projectors for them. After that, they have some flexibility in choosing technology that they will use in their classrooms. Last year, one teacher requested an iPhone for his technology from the project. I declined his request on the basis that I could not make a strong enough case for the use of an iPhone in the classroom. I have purchased iPods for several teachers with the understanding that the teacher plans to do some podcasting and may loan the iPod to students for use in review. I could not see a teacher loaning a student his iPhone for any reason, so I denied the request.

As I think more about communities of practice, however, I want to consider if an iPhone or similar technology might be justifiable in one of these projects as a device that can encourage and foster more interaction between teachers. Would an iPhone in teachers’ hands make it more likely that they would read each other’s blogs? Would they use the iPhone to discover more resources that could help other teachers? Could they use their iPhone in their own classroom? Would an iPhone make it easier and more likely for teachers to request help from other members of the group?

To help answer some of these questions, I’ll first consider our experiences with notebook computers. Before these teachers entered our group, many of them did not have a notebook computer. Some did not have a dedicated computer in their classroom. Some may not have had a computer at home. Some did not know how to use a computer as a teaching tool. We have made progress in all of these areas. We also see them now using their computers to communicate with each other. They use their computers to retrieve new knowledge and tools from the Internet and they share them with each other. They have used their technology to develop and teach new lesson plans. The programs have been successful in helping teachers use new technology and gain new skills that they apply in their classrooms, hopefully producing a better teaching-learning environment and ultimately more educated students. This demonstrates that the group has been receptive to new technology, and that they have changed some of their practices to incorporate things they learn in our programs. The notebook computer experience also demonstrates that the teachers are willing to use this technology to communicate with other members of the group.

Will teachers accept something like an edublogs site as the online tool for their community? To date, we have only used email and a listserv to share ideas and resources. This summer, we will use an edublogs site to share ideas and resources, and phase out the listserv (assuming the site is successful). Teachers in our groups do not want new toys just to have new toys. They will only adopt new practices if they are convinced of the added value over what they have been doing. Teachers will need to be convinced of the value of staying in contact through an edublogs site if they are to persist beyond the summer workshop (where it will be highly encouraged).

If the teachers buy into the online community tool, then perhaps we will be ready to ask the last question: will they use iPhones to help them connect to the community? To answer this question at the moment, I can only draw on limited personal experience with an iPhone, and that of a few friends who also have one. I use iPhone for many tasks on a regular basis (see my review), with one common task being retrieving information. I’m guessing that for teachers to use iPhones to connect to our community, they will need to believe that it contains information that they want or need to use. However, much of what they like to do in the group is retrieve files. iPhones will allow them to learn about new posts, but not actually get the files. For that, they will still rely on their computers. One of my colleagues is now famous for walking across campus while typing something to his class in their online community. Certainly our students have wholeheartedly adopted the idea of using phones to communicate with text. I suppose, the real answer to the question will be determined by their perception of the iPhone’s capabilities applied to the community makes it worth while. They can learn that new files are posted. They can see new links posted and visit those websites. They can see new movies posted and hear new podcasts that are available. Perhaps this might be enough to cause most of them to use their iPhones to connect with their community.

I will be very interested to see how they receive the edublogs site, and whether they persist in using it. I think that will be a significant indicator regarding the promise of using iPhones to connect with each other, so I’ll go observe and write more at a later time.

To get my iPhone, I wrote a proposal about some ways I would like to use iPhones in my classes. Some things I envisioned are possible with current iPhones. Other activities may be possible in the future. In my Introductory Chemistry lab, students take a final examination, part of which deals with procedures in the laboratory. This can be a difficult topic to test in the traditional manner, with words and figures. iPhones would allow for a test question to refer to a video recorded procedure on YouTube. The question would ask if the procedure shown is correct, and if not, what is wrong with it or how would the error affect the student’s results. There could be several different versions, allowing for students to have different exam versions.

In my Consumer Chemistry course, we spend a great deal of time discussing chemical background of environmental issues. One in-class assignment could be for students to find, view, and critique recent media reports on environmental issues. Students might be asked to decide if the report contained enough explanation of the science involved in the issue. They might be asked about the accuracy of the description of the science. They might be asked to re-write the report adding more science description and more accurate science description. They might then be asked to video record their revised report for viewing by the whole class. The last part of this assignment is not currently possible with the iPhone because current iPhones do not record video.

The last part of my proposal uses features that are not currently available on the iPhone, at least commercially on an un-jail-broken phone. I envision students in my analytical chemistry class on a small boat motoring across a nearby lake. As they move, they use a nitrate-specific electrode to measure nitrate concentrations in the lake. Simultaneously, they are recording latitude/longitude data with GPS capability as they go. Combined, the coordinates and nitrate data allow students to assemble a concentration map. In my proposal, I envision that the students discover a nitrate plume entering the lake from a specific stream. They begin sampling the stream and trace the nitrates upstream to a park where runoff water from the university flows down the street and into the stream. Ultimately, students use their iPhones to determine that the nitrates are coming from the fertilizer used by the university.

The nitrate specific electrode is representative of a wide variety probes that produce an electric potential that varies in a linear (or at least known) way with some measured quantity, in this case concentration of nitrate in a solution. Other probes that we use routinely in Introductory and General Chemistry courses are temperature, pressure, pH, and voltage. Our department would like to use iPhones to collect data from probes like these. When this becomes possible, students’ personal iPhones can replace our 32 lab computers, saving the university around $30,000 every three years.

In order for probes to be used with iPhones, the potential-versus-value curve must be known, software for the iPhone to acquire, store, and present the data in a meaningful way must be written for iPhone, and an interface between iPhones and probes must be created. Another important factor is the power demands of the probes. A representative of a company that makes probes like we use for teaching labs told me that some of their probes consume tens of milliamps, which might create a problem if they must be powered by the iPhone. An alternative is to have some kind of interface that provides its own power for the probe, such as Vernier’s LabPro interface. This device uses a USB connection to computers, so a similar connection to iPhones seems reasonable. An alternative might be to use a Bluetooth or wi-fi communication scheme to connect the probe/interface to the iPhone. Some have reported devices that communicate data to iPhone via WiFi. A similar communication scheme for probeware is easily imagined. At the moment, we have not identified anyone who is willing and able to perform the necessary hardware and software development to make this idea possible.

Tasks accomplished with iPhone
Within a few days of activating my iPhone, I found myself near the end of the world at my in-laws for Thanksgiving. I had my trusty MacBook Pro, but no hope of an Internet connection. This posed a significant problem to me because one of the football teams I closely follow was in a playoff game that weekend, but no local media were covering it. With the iPhone, however, I was able to learn of my team’s unfortunate demise. This demonstrates the iPhone’s ability for me (or my students) to retrieve important information (yes, a football score is extremely important) in remote locations without traditional access to the Internet.

On the same weekend in the same place, I received an email message from a student requesting a copy of the review for the exam on Monday. This would have been a problem except for the fact that another student had made a similar request when I was back at home. For the first student, I sent a copy of the review via email from my MacBook Pro. For the second student, I was able to access my Gmail account and forward that same message to him, with the review still attached. This demonstrates a second key ability of the iPhone: to provide or send important information from a remote location without traditional access to the Internet.

Just for kicks the next week, I wanted to see if I could make use of the device in a classroom setting. In my Organic Spectroscopy class, one day’s discussion included the concept of a correlation chart for nuclear magnetic resonance spectroscopy. Rather than show a copy of a figure from book, I wanted to use the iPhone to display an example of such a chart. This is one example of such a chart. I pulled this up on my iPhone and placed it under the document camera (with a lot of zoom) and demonstrated the ability to display graphical data and figures in a classroom setting. Now, granted, there are easier ways to do this with the correct planning ahead of time. The iPhone is not going to replace my Mac for displaying most presentations, but on the fly, it can fill in, especially if my Mac didn’t come to class that day.

About a year ago, I got a cool new watch that sets itself with radio signals from Colorado. I love that part, but the watch it replaced had a timer, which I used regularly. The new watch has no timer. Another reason I was glad to activate the iPhone was that it has a simple but effective timer function. In the lab this comes in handy when we have to time a reaction or a step in a chemical procedure. This also comes in handy when we have a 30-minute wait at our favorite restaurant. I set the timer and then show the kids every time they ask “How much longer?” This demonstrates the timer ability of the iPhone.

I’m no super saint, but I worship at a church that meets three times each week and I teach a Christian university that values the integration of faith and learning. Whether at church, school, or home, I often want to read the Bible. Several web sites make this quite easy on the iPhone, but my favorite is biblegateway.com, even though it is not yet optimized for iPhone. I can search by book, chapter, and verse (e.g. John 3:16) or by topic or keyword. Typically, I have searched by book and chapter, which also gives me the context for whatever passage we are reading at the moment. Last Sunday, I was comfortable enough with it that I used the iPhone rather than a paper Bible for my scripture reading from the podium at church. Though it went well, looking back I probably should have switched to airplane mode to avoid any interference with the sound system. This again demonstrates a key ability of the iPhone that I mentioned earlier: to retrieve information in remote locations without traditional access to the Internet.

One way the iPhone improves upon the notebook computer is in the ability to retrieve information spontaneously. I teach a summer workshop with secondary science teachers. As part of the workshop, I provide them with new notebook computers. Our facility has wireless capabilities, so the teachers are very quickly surfing the Internet during our meetings. On a daily if not hourly basis, unexpected questions come up regarding the science content of the lessons we are working on, or any other topic. Within two minutes of these questions coming up, five different people across the room will have the answer to the question posed by members of the group. It is this spontaneous ability to retrieve information and answer questions that makes the iPhone so powerful, in my mind. Most of the students in my classes at the university don’t bring their notebook computers to class with them. Some don’t even have one. Virtually all of them have a cell phone and bring it with them. If they all had the ability to use the Internet during class, I can guess that we could take advantage of many of these spontaneous learning opportunities.

In a Bible class at church, someone mentioned the phrase, “The Lord helps those who help themselves,” and attributed it to the Bible. Proving that the phrase is not in the Bible is difficult without an extensive concordance, but with iPhone, I searched for key words in the phrase, and was able to convince myself it did not come from the Bible. I then searched for the phrase on Google and concluded that it was indeed from an extra-biblical source.

My review is continued in Part 2.