Considering fun-oriented behaviors in learning with mobile technologies outside the classroom

A number of studies have reported that many college students own multiple mobile devices, and use them on and off campus (Caverly, 2012).An increase in mobile device usage among college students has been documented in different countries. Kobusm Rietveld, & van Ommeren (2013) found that over 95% of Dutch students own at least one mobile device, and students bring hand-held mobile devices to campus, rather than laptops or tablets because they are easier to carry around. In this paper, we explore the challenges of mobile devices for academic purposes outside the classroom. We bring our results from a very specific population from two different countries, with the USA population reflecting students from the education field, and students from Israel the engineering and science fields. This study can contribute to the generalization of the results in terms of the contribution to the education field and information systems designers who need to analyze and design applications for academic purposes. Research on learning outside the classroom using mobile technologies seems to be sparse, indicating that there is a gap in the research between learning within and beyond the classroom using mobile technologies. The purpose of this paper is to examine different mobile devices usages, including phone calls, emailing, listening to music, taking pictures, recording videos, searching for information and reading online, developed to reflect media usage items on a smart phone. It further considers how different mobile devices influence the use for academic purpose outside the school by the individual to complete class assignments outside school, and for collaboration with classmates on group projects.