Collaborative Mobile-Learning Systems for Music Education and Training

Abstract

With recent advances in mobile technology, intelligent user interfaces, and contextual modelling, a new learning paradigm, mobile learning, has emerged. Although this research field is growing rapidly, research into the benefits of mobile learning for music education is still limited [38].

The combination of music and information and communication technology has come to be viewed as a primary catalyst for change. Indeed, mobile technology has become so powerful that people have begun to use the mobile device as a creative and expressive musical instrument, inviting new thinking on music composition. Furthermore, people use the mobile device as a spontaneous, portable, personalised, and interactive digital learning tool. Through mobile learning, present practices in music education can be reviewed, recontextualized, and even transformed and improved.

Since music composition and performance benefit from collaboration among knowledgeable peers, this thesis seeks to understand the human factors involved in collaborative mobile learning of music. It also discusses the philosophy, design, and development of two systems for music education to make mobile learning more usable for music educators and students of different musical and cognitive abilities.

We developed two mobile learning systems to address three special needs of learners. The first system, MOGCLASS (Musical mObile Group for Classroom Learning And Study in Schools), provides three virtual musical interfaces with various sound and gesture simulations for different kinds of musical instruments. Collaboration is more organised and focused through what is called a virtual sound space, which allows students within a group to hear each other's devices via headphones. Since they do not hear sounds produced by other groups and the sounds they produce are not heard by other groups, noise resulting from different groups playing at the same time is eliminated. Students' activities can be coordinated using the teacher's device, which can also monitor and control students' devices wirelessly.

The second system, MOGAT (MObile Games with Auditory Training), uses three structured musical games to improve aural habilitation through music. Intended for children with cochlear implants, MOGAT has a cloud-based web service that enables special music educators to monitor and design individual training for each child.

This thesis also extends the MOGCLASS system to include an assistive tool for individuals with muscular dystrophy. The pilot study that we conducted to evaluate this system showed that the subjects achieved higher perceived enjoyment, success, and motivation during their group music therapy.