My colleague @ashley_salter and I conducted a number of face-to-face interviews with students about their experience using mobile technology to support their learning, with a particular focus on the Canvas Student App. These interviews helped us better understand the impact of this app and direct our communication to Instructure and Canvas Community. In the second of a series of blog posts from UCF, here is the story of Maddie.
Maddie is all about UCF and bleeds black and gold. Both her parents graduated from UCF, and she is very active on campus as a social media coordinator and the Director of Black & Gold Studios. In addition to her many activities, Maddie is also a junior studying Communication & Conflict with a Legal Studies Minor.
“The mobile app provides me ease of access when communicating with my instructors and peers on the spur of the moment.”
Maddie is a very involved student with a full-time course load, on-campus employment, and extracurricular activities. She is part of an academic program that is offered entirely online, although that was not her deciding factor in choosing her major. Maddie is highly involved with social media presence and would feel helpless without her smartphone. She states she can go more than a week without her laptop computer but couldn’t imagine life without her phone.
“I use the calendar feature on the Canvas Mobile app to organize my life week by week. I know what is due and when it’s due in one place."
Like most UCF students, the most frequent feature Maddie uses within the Canvas Student app is grades. She checks her grades often and benefits from the notifications that occur when assignments are graded. Another frequently used feature is the calendar as she utilizes each week to keep track of what assignments and important dates are coming up. Being able to track this from a centralized location while on-the-go rather than searching individual lists or checking the syllabus is vital to keeping her on task.
“The more reminders and notifications Canvas can give me the better I can stay on top of my school work.”
Maddie considers the notifications she receives as quite helpful. However, she doesn't activate the discussion posts or comments as those can be overwhelming. She prefers to receive grades, assignment feedback, and message notifications as they are necessary to maintain her academic success. Maddie feels that the communication taking place from on-the-go instances are important for students like her to stay on top of their work. Being able to communicate almost instantly with her professors or other classmates helps her feel engaged and informed.
“I finished my discussion post while waiting to board my flight!”
Without a smartphone or mobile device in general, Maddie feels her life would be more complicated. She uses a smartphone for more than just communication. She’s used her phone for recording interviews, taking photos, and being able to research with ease. Maddie feels that the Canvas Student app helps with distance learning. She has used it in several situations, such as submitting a video for a Spanish class or submitting discussions posts, where she believes it's almost faster to complete on the mobile device rather than on a laptop. She even used the discussion feature while waiting to board a flight when she realized she needed to respond to a post.
