You've clearly laid out the advantages and drawbacks or barriers to mLearning, but my take is that regardless, mobile learning is here not only to stay, but grow, especially for personal and business / corporate use.
The classroom is another story, where adoption will be slow due to, as you mentioned, culture, pedagogy, and particularly distraction which a mobile device is basically created to do. But as the popularity of mLearning devices grow, invariably, the education system may have to come up with a way to harness the power of mobile tech while minimizing its drawbacks. Regardless, I don't see broad adoption mLearning in the classroom happening any time soon - considering the education system has enough problems fully utilizing the technology already available.
Hi Alice,
Thanks for your comments. I agree, it is definitely here to stay, however in what capacity remains to be seen. In my own workplace, we have a diverse group of people from all socio-economic backgrounds. And what I have seen is, no matter what, even if they can't afford basics, everyone has a phone. Some may or may not have laptops or computers, but they all have phones, which results in many of these ESL students accessing their classroom work through their phones. I think most educational organizations will require online work, but they must be cognizant that everything works in a mobile environment.