Japan's largest cell phone carrier NTT DoCoMo recently released a product called the "Fitness Phone." The device, which can measure your pulse or determine how much you've walked, will provide heath advice to users (apparently, it can also tell you whether you need a breath mint).
The video below made me think about other potential educational applications we might build into the cell phone. For example, what about an application that helped students to prepare for the NYS Regents Exam? At different points in the school year, the cell phone could prompt students with questions about specific topics they should have already covered in their U.S. History class. Based on a student's response, the phone could then provide advice to students (e.g., content areas requiring further study, resources to seek out) to help them be more successful on the exam. The irony of such an application/tool is that it challenges the very necessity of the assessment in the first place, especially since all the knowledge can be accessed on demand.
Anyone else have any potential ideas? Anyone interested in putting together a project proposal for the EdLab around this topic?
