ODCSSS 2006 Quote

“In previous academic areas challenges have proved trivial and in bluntness, googleable. I enjoyed working in new fields that I did not understand while creating new solutions for unique problems. I also enjoyed having a tangible project complete to demonstrate.”

-ODCSSS 2006 Student

Project 0506-ucd: m-learning to tackle adult literacy

Adult and child literacy are major concerns in both the developing and the developed world. It is estimated that around 1 billion people are unable to read or write around the world, two thirds of whom are women. Taking Ireland as an example, the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) carried out research in the 1990s revealing that about 25% of the Irish population scored at the lowest level of literacy. This situation is obviously much worse in developing countries where even basic educational facilities are lacking. By 2025, Sub-Saharan Africa will have a population of 1 billion people, half below the age of 20 and most will live in poverty.

One approach to tackling this literacy problem is through the use of technology. The goal of this research project is to develop software to teach adults to read using mobile phone messaging. The basic idea is that lessons will be created consisting of written words, images and audio. These will be sent to the user's mobile phone, on demand by the user. The system will keep track of the user's progress and allow each user advance at their own pace.

The project will be carried out with the support of Camara and Ericsson Ireland. Camara is a relatively new not-for-profit organisation whose aim is to help tackle poverty in the developing world through providing computers for use as basic educational tools. Camara also produces and distributes low-cost educational software that is relevant to the local communities that use it. Camara will be able to facilitate testing our m-learning package onsite in Africa for beta-testing, and also in Dublin during development where Camara has identified native speakers to test the technology. Ericsson Ireland have agreed to participate in the testing of the technology via the provision of technical support and mobile services.

Relevance of Project to the Host Laboratories:

This project will build on significant research experience available in the School of Computer Science and Informatics, in the areas of delivering content to mobile technology, human language technology and eLearning.

Supervisors:

Dr. Joe Carthy & Dr. Michela Bertolotto (Computer Science and Informatics, UCD)

 

Keywords:

M-learning, mobile technology, human language technology