Using persuasive marketing methods and mobile phones as active learning devices to enhance students' learning

One of the latest additions to the educator's toolbox are learning parcels sent to the students' mobile phones. We used a four factor sales and marketing model from previous research to produce and evaluate the contents of the learning parcels and the mobile phone concept. The four factors are: Relevance, timeliness, responsibility and value. In an action research program during the first semester of 2015, we tested to which degree the students felt their curriculum knowledge improved through the use of learning parcels on their mobile phones. We learned that the novelty effect of using mobile phones as a medium quickly evaporated. The use of the learning parcels depends to a high degree on the instant feeling of high usefulness in relation to the four factors and is decisive for students' use of the learning parcels and the concept as such. A significant number of the students liked the concept, and were sure of its positive learning outcome. Purpose The purpose of this paper is to present the development and effectiveness test of a series of learning packets sent to the mobile phones of students taking a Bachelor's degree. A four-factor research model is presented that can be used for accessing new teaching tools and the contents of learning parcels. Design/methodology/approach We tested the four-factor model and the use of learning parcels on one class of Norwegian students. 135 students established an account, and 57 student made use of the APP and downloaded in total ten learning parcels. These were weekly send to their mobile phones, assisting them in understanding specific parts of the curriculum. Findings - Students experienced improved learning outcomes through the use of learning parcels on their mobile phones. The contents of the learning parcels should be optimized by the use of our four-factor model. The universal model can be used to judge learning parcels in industrial teaching and training programs. The contents are more engaging when the medium is a mobile phone and the length of the contents is short and engaging. Research limitations/implications It would be rewarding to measure the effect on the outcome of the mobile learning parcels on the results of the students. We have only their own opinion on the effect. The results from the action research will be used in a new round of action research this year and next year. It will then be possible to compare the alterations made from the first round of research presented here. Originality/value This paper appears to be the first, which simultaneously examines the use of a marketing model to target contents of learning parcels and the use of mobile phones as learning media.