Umera Imtinan

This study was conducted to explore education delivery formats aligned with Pakistan’s Vision 2030 for education. Data were obtained from focus group discussions conducted with 31 students (10 female, 21 male) from three mainstream Pakistani universities. Qualitative data were analysed thematically. The authors’ findings show that students were excited about the flexibility offered by mobile learning and the opportunity to collaborate with peers and teachers from home and other locations at various times. However, they also reported a number of challenges, such as cost, a lack of awareness, and universities’ failure to invest in mobile learning course design. The study’s findings and implications for practice are presented in order to help facilitate the implementation of mobile learning in developing countries, both in higher education and in other sectors, such as training, workplace learning and educational outreach to serve remote and disadvantaged communities (e.g. out-of-school children).

In recent years, “sustainability education” in Higher Education has become an increasingly popular topic among researchers driven by the constant calls for the research community to contribute novel research that can aid in building a sustainable world. The objective of this paper was to explore how sustainability concepts have been integrated in Information Systems (IS) curricula, to determine the state of knowledge in this area and provide guidance for future research. Using Arksey and O’Malley’s five-stage scoping review process, the current landscape of sustainability in IS classrooms is mapped and key themes and factors which were found to influence sustainability education in IS are identified. Eight databases were searched for relevant papers published on this topic. Fifteen articles were selected and deemed high quality for a thematic analysis. As a result, nine themes emerged from the thematic analysis, and key research gaps and directions for future research are presented. The findings show that there is currently no unified approach to sustainability education in IS. This paper presents the themes in a novel conceptual research framework which can guide the incorporation of sustainability concepts in IS education. In addition, the framework can be used as the basis for future research in this area.

The purpose of this paper is to answer the question ‘Why reflection is important to introduce in the teaching and learning’. This paper commences with a brief literature review on reflection, followed by the provision of tentative results of a study on the role of reflection in learning. Data collected from a sample population of 257 undergraduate students at business ethics undergraduate class in Australia were analysed. The data were collected from students’ own reflections that formed part of two of their assessments in the unit. In the first assessment, students were asked to reflect on their own moral development, using Schon’s reflection in and on action, to allow the markers understand the students’ own moral development as highlighted by Kohlberg levels and stages of Moral Development. In the second assessment, the students were asked to reflect on their personal learning as a global citizen and how this assessment has informed their views and perspective on ethical decision-making process and global citizenship using one of the frameworks introduced during the semester (e.g. situation, task, action, result, learning, planning – S.T.A.R.L.P., Gibbs or Kolb). This paper will not discuss students moral developments levels or their ethical decision making, but, will only discuss the ‘reflection’, thus, the findings from this research come in twofold: (i) students acknowledged the new skills they gained, the development of other skills they had through their reflections, such as critical thinking, time management. (ii) Most of the students have demonstrated an understanding of reflection in higher education, and ethical decision making, through use of different frameworks. However, some students felt reflection is difficult, thus, the paper concludes with a recommendation to introduce reflection in the first year of university.

In this chapter, we discuss initiatives that aim to improve children's literacy in low- and middle-income (LMI) countries through m-learning. These projects, predominantly introduced by governments and international aid organisations, often involve the provision of e-books and apps including game-based apps, to be used either inside or outside school. In some cases, lesson plans and content for teachers in poorly resourced schools are also delivered via mobile devices. After a general overview, we briefly describe a selection of projects with reference to m-learning and literacy theory and research. It is indicated in this chapter that the use of mobile devices to improve literacy opportunities for children in LMI countries has a great deal of potential but that, in many cases, there are limitations in pedagogical design and implementation practices, not to mention restricted views of what literacy is and might be for children in these locations.

In higher education environments in the Asia-Pacific particularly in South Asian region, mobile learning introduction and implementation are associated with certain challenges in order to harness its true benefits and potential. This research aims at investigating the feasibility of a potential introduction of mobile learning into Pakistani university environments. The expectations of students and senior university leadership stakeholders on key policy-making roles were investigated during this exploratory case study research. From three of the Pakistani mainstream universities, students and teachers participated in focus groups and discussion sessions, and leadership stakeholders were invited for individual interviews. The findings of the research indicate that there are several implications for practice by university leadership stakeholders if mobile learning is to be included in mainstream education in university environments in South Asian region. Findings of the research show that universities might need to adapt the paradigm shift in pedagogies from traditional face-to-face learning to mobile learning, resulting in updating certain key factors in university teaching and learning environments such as changing teaching philosophies and modifying learning resources. Further, mobile learning initiatives would require universities to modify several policies regarding students' attendance, use of mobile devices in university premises and classrooms and adjusting teachers' workload. The findings of the research could be generalised for the university environments in other South Asian countries such as India, Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, Nepal and Bhutan due to similar sociocultural environments in those countries.

This study aims to examine the risks and opportunities associated with adopting sustainability in higher education, focusing on Pakistan. The issues related to climate change and global warming have surpassed shocking levels to the extent that it is being discussed in major forums on a frequent basis. Most recently a summit organised in Paris, United Nations conference on climate change (COP21), aims to address these issues. More than 150 Heads of States and Governments are due to participate in this conference, making it one of the largest diplomatic conferences ever organised, aside from the United Nations General Assembly sessions. Literature review shows us that many steps have been taken in order to address these issues, however, as we are reminded by Albert Einstein". it is important to avoid doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results". Pakistan, being a developing country, is at a cross-road as a wide range of issues bear down upon it. Maintaining sustainability and stabilising the sustainability agenda is not one of the primary focus for its government. As it is known that poverty and sustainability go hand-in-hand, Pakistan must first adhere to the agenda of the Rio Convention of 1992 for eradication of poverty in order to increase the production and sustainability so that the needs of the majority of people can be met. Pakistan currently stands at number 8 on the list of 10 countries that will bear the worst implications of climate change. It is estimated that current pledges to cut carbon emissions will cost developing countries 50% more in the near future as compared to previous years. Higher education around the world is of prime focus as the forces of change present various challenges. These challenges are multifaceted, interconnected and are reinforced by social, economic, cultural and environmental developments. This setting puts higher education in a leadership role which calls for development of future leaders who are fully equipped to handle these challenges effectively.

Recently, nodes cooperation has emerged as a popular means for improving the quality of multimedia delivery over fifth-generation cellular networks. However, in the conventional relaying scheme such as amplify-and-forward (AaF), there is a higher probability of duplicate packets at the receiver node which affect the decoding probability and consequently deteriorate the quality of multimedia transmission. In this study, the authors propose a cooperative multimedia transmission protocol based on a novel merge-and-forward relaying and the best relay selection (RS) schemes. Their best RS scheme is based on two important parameters: (i) two-hop link distances and (ii) minimum block error rate value. Moreover, to combat the packet loss for enhanced and reliable video delivery, they adopt application layer forward error correction scheme which is based on the most improved and advanced version of fountain codes (i.e. RaptorQ codes). They evaluate the performance of the proposed scheme under different time-sharing scenarios between the direct and best indirect transmission links in terms of decoding failure probability, decoding overhead, peak signal-to-noise ratio, and mean opinion score. Simulation results show that the proposed scheme outperforms the conventional AaF relaying scheme.

Technology has played a key role in reshaping the way education is being delivered in university environments. Mobile technologies are one of the latest technologies to enter the higher education arenas around the world, offering great potential for teaching and learning. Students and teachers have been using mobile devices for formal and informal collaboration, communication, and connectivity within learning environments for a couple of decades without recognizing it as mobile learning. Mobile learning needs to be researched and theorized in order to be included in formal educational Information and Communication Technologies and its full potential harnessed for the future generations. A number of mobile learning researchers borrowed traditional learning models as theoretical foundations for mobile learning research. However, theories from a diverse range of subject areas such as Education, Information Systems, Human-Computer Interaction, and Telecommunication Engineering have also been used as the basis for mobile learning projects around the world. This incorporation of a diversity of disciplines and subjects has made mobile learning a multidisciplinary research field. This chapter aims to review the current mobile learning theories, models, and frameworks with the lens of mobile learning characteristics and challenges pointed out by prominent mobile learning researchers across the world in order to present the case of mobile learning as the future of teaching and learning.

This study investigates students’ perceptions of the role of the teacher in a proposed mobile learning environment in a developing country. The research is based on an exploratory case study at selected Pakistani universities using a qualitative data collection approach, such as focus groups. The paper aims to highlight one of the key issues, the teacher’s role in the domain of mobile learning, given that mobile learning has been suggested as tending to making students more independent learners since they learn on the move or at work. It was found that students did need a lot of teachers’ input throughout the learning process and wanted the teacher to control the learning process, with the exception of a few students who did show interest to be independent learners.

This paper examines and reviews the current literature on mobile learning in developing countries. Mobile device is becoming a more popular interface for connecting with the world and mode of digital presence than the desktop computing devices. Mobile technologies in the developing world enable people to connect to the Internet, become more conversant with the digital world, and network globally via social networking forums. Mobile technologies in developing countries such as India, Indonesia, Pakistan, Kenya and South Africa have significantly increased and advanced. In spite of limited Information and Communications Technology (ICT) resources and an unstable infrastructure, good telecom services exist in the form of cellular networks which provide a favourable environment for mobile learning. The literature suggests that there is pervasive use of mobile devices that would facilitate the uptake of mobile learning in developing countries. However, few researchers have looked into the potential use of mobile devices in learning environments in developing countries. To ascertain the extent of mobile leaning in developing countries, this paper examines the current literature on mobile learning research in developing countries including projects, implementations, theories and conceptualizations of mobile learning for these countries.