Handheld Learning - learning with mobile and ubiquitous technologies

The question, does small mean handheld? is a good one. I've been tossing around the issue of defining what a handheld is with some of my colleagues here. One of the conclusions we've reached is that it doesn't just depend on the device (size, shape, footprint, etc.), but also the user. Small for an adult may mean something different than small for a child, e.g. a six-year old. One definition we will be using for some writing we will do soon is this one (note that we are using the device in question here not a handheld, but a highly mobile device, because it includes more than what we would probably consider to be a handheld:


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•   high mobility (that is, they are small enough that elementary school students can hold the device in one hand and carry it from place to place);
•   a small footprint (so that they do not intrude in face-to-face interactions);
•   the computational and display capabilities to view, collect, or otherwise use representations and/or large amounts of data; and
•   the ability to support collaboration and/or data sharing.

Devices included in our definition are PDAs, mobile phones, some tablet computers, networked graphing calculators, the recently announced Origami device, the new generation of handheld gaming systems, iPods, motes, data loggers, etc.  The definition leaves out traditional laptop computers; while they have been found to be useful in education (and much has been written about their virtues), they do not fit our definition of highly mobile, and their footprint is such that they tend to intrude in face-to-face interactions.

Note that one of the foci of this definition is the idea that a highly mobile device supports and encourages interaction between users, esp. face-to-face interactions (like we would envision in a classroom or informal environment). A laptop, for example, tends to be less effective in this respect, just because of its sheer size (and we've found this even with smaller laptops). Being able to hold the device in one hand and not having to set it down seems to be the key. This does work with something like a tablet, because it tends to get used/held more like a clipboard, cradled on the forearm.