Since taking an mlearning course a few weeks ago, I think I have become obsessed with QR codes. Not that I hadn’t seen them before, I have been using one to give contact details at the end of talks for a while but I think the course heightened my awareness of them, well that and I think there has been a sudden rise in their use.
One of the things we discussed on the course was the fact they were few and far between but since then they seem to have started to appear everywhere.
Living in Oxford this time year of year the city is full, and I really mean full, of students learning English at one summer school or the other. The same goes for London where I had to venture for a meeting last week. Putting students and QR codes together it struck me that there is a project or two in making use of the rise of the QR code. So I set myself the task of ‘collecting’ all the QR codes I came across on my walk to and from the meeting.
Given the amount of smart phones and cameras the students seem to have this is something they could do, as well as using a QR app to go to the websites. Since the QR codes are on public display there is little chance that a young student will be directed to something unsuitable (though one code I collected was for a betting app).
Link to the site ( it wouldn’t embed) here
Simple tasks could involve ‘who collects the most’ but to ensure that language is involved the students need to display and label the apps. I used linoit.com to show the QR codes I collected. My reasons for using this are that it is easy to use, free and can be used collaboratively. It also has the added feature of having an app so I can do everything from taking a pic of the code to displaying it from my phone.
Other tasks can involve deciding which is the most interesting website that are taken to, which sites would appeal to which type person and so on. Lots of chance for productive practice of English, all done via a phone and an internet collection. Seems to me that this type of mlearning could be an easy and relatively hassle free task to keep students purposefully occupied as they tour round the UK ‘must see’ towns and cities.
Now next up is turning the centre of Oxford into one big QR treasure hunt, any one up for that?
