Been giving a lot of thought to mobile learning lately. After some reflection of what I've seen in blogs, at a recent seminar, and at conferences etc, there seems to be several primary approaches to or uses of "mobile learning."Mobile Delivery of Content. Perhaps the simplest form of "mobile learning," simply making content available to learners via a mobile interface: through a proprietary interface like Blackboard Learn or a mobile website developed in house.
Mobile Communication. In addition to mobile delivery of content, mobile learning can take advantage of anytime/anywhere and always on communication channels to enable increased communication: learner-to-learner, learner-to-faculty, learner-to-group, or learner-to-public.
Augmented Reality. Rather than simply delivering traditional content through mobile devices, augmented reality learning leverages mobile technologies to juxtapose information and content with an out-of-classroom type experience. For example, having learners use Art, an iPhone application, to access content and information while viewing select pieces by an artist during an individual museum visit.
Personally, mobile learning doesn't present anything new or unique with the simple delivery of content via mobile devices; the content is the same; learner interactions are essentially the same; the only thing that's difference is the location and timing of learner-to-content interaction. I know of at least one less formal study that's in progress to determine if mobile delivery of content engages students differently enough that they spend more time with content. My guesstimation is any benefits to learning of simple mobile delivery of content will be marginal over the long term; any gains reported in early studies may prove to be the result of learners engaging the novelty of mobile delivered content.
The true benefits to learning of mobile computing, I think, lie in mobile communication and the design of augmented reality learning experiences. Increased availability of the learning community within a classroom and the access by learners to the global community via mobile channels of communication may have long term, lasting benefits to education, and certainly, finding ways to engage learners with content accessed via technology within the context of authentic (non-classroom) environments will provide opportunities we've not had previously in traditional, formal learning spaces.
(image CC Steven Parker via http://www.flickr.com/photos/stevenraymondparker/232424547/)

I'm still waiting on my Google Wave invite, although I do have reason to believe one is "in the mail." In the interim, it seems Wave is on an accelerated hype cycle - already finding itself in a trough of anti-hype and complaints regarding the usability and productive utility of the application.