Call for papers: Mobile Learning and Knowledge Management: Issues in Intellectual Proximity

Call for papers: Mobile Learning and Knowledge Management: Issues in Intellectual Proximity

A special issue of International Journal of Mobile Learning and Organisation

Enterprises have turned to explicit - and even conceptualising on tacit - knowledge management to elaborate a systematic approach to develop and sustain the intellectual capital needed to succeed, the knowledge normally attributed to knowledge workers. This is complemented by structural capital, i.e. the structures, technologies, practices put in place by an organisation as an attempt to manage their specialist knowledge. Mobile learning would equally come under such an umbrella, enticing knowledge workers and managers within organisations to conduct work in a mobile manner.

One of the challenges for future mobile organisations will deal with how they can enhance communication channels and collaborate within and between their employees, customers and stakeholders. According to Liebowitz (Liebowitz, 2006), one technique that can help address this issue is social network analysis. Mobile organisations also need to develop new knowledge and learning strategies possibly under the umbrella of a knowledge exchange or sharing system, and especially as related to recognition and reward systems. Uden (Uden, 2006) suggests that activity theory, as a social and cultural psychological theory, can be used to design a mobile learning environment.

Existing theoretical work has paid limited attention to the role of intellectual proximity in facilitating knowledge exchange within clusters of organisations that operate within the same domain of knowledge.

A consensus suggests that users build a mental model from their interactions with artificial systems. Design of mobile devices needs tp to take into consideration the existence of a gap between the user’s viewpoint [interaction-oriented] and the designer’s viewpoint [development-oriented]. Enhancing mobile learning effectiveness requires narrowing this gap between execution and conception. Implementing new solutions for improving the effective use of mobile systems needs new methodological tools and a better understanding of the complexity of user’s mental construction, in line with their containment of the domain knowledge.

The purpose of this special issue is to expose writers and the eventual readership to topics aiming at the facilitation of mobile learning for knowledge workers, from differing and multidisciplinary perspectives.

This special issue aims at presenting a selection of papers addressing the topics indicated below, but is not limited to them:

• Knowledge management and mobile learning
• Knowledge flow and mobile learning
• Dissemination of practice and mobile learning
• Currently implemented applications for mobile learning
• Technologies that directly support mobile learning systems (devices, networks, tools etc.)
• Studies of mobile learning in practice
• Reviews of the application of mobile learning in multiple contexts
• Uses of mobile learning in professional learning environments, e.g., mobile health, mobile commerce
• Constraints in the delivery of mobile learning, e.g., human-computer interaction issues in mobile learning environments
• Mobile games for learning
• The role of Wikis, blogs, podcasts, messaging, other on-line tools and Web 2.0 components in mobile learning systems and as mechanisms to exchange/distribute knowledgeSupport for learner interaction and mobile collaborative learning
• Privacy and security issues in mobile learning
• Knowledge expropriation or hoarding issues in mobile learning
• The role of location based services in learning and sharing knowledge
• Organisational structures and mobile learning
• Management issues from mobile learning
• Design of user-friendly mobile devices
• Mental models emerging from interactions with mobile systems
• User's characteristics (age, gender, culture, expertise, etc.) and mobile learning
• Graphic user interface (GUI) design and mobile learning
• Mobile learning interactions and cognitive modeling

Important Dates

Full paper deadline: 1 September, 2007
Notification of acceptance and review results: 1 November, 2007
Camera-ready version deadline: 6 January, 2008