How are teachers using mobile devices?

As we get ready to prototype a BYOD Device 2 with our students in elementary, middle and high schools, the R&D Task Force that I'm working on decided it would be a good idea to investigate what our teachers are already using their second devices for.  Since we are researching what changes to teaching and learning will happen with the introduction of a secondary device, we are interested in discovering what is the secondary device of preference for many of the tasks teachers commonly perform.  Last week a survey of elementary teachers was conducted, asking which devices (smartphones, tablets, iTouches, eReaders and netbooks) were preferred for several different tasks.  The survey revealed the following data:

• Smartphones were preferred for calendar alerts and reminders, audio recording, calculating, playing games, GPS, translating, microblogging, note taking, taking and editing photos, video recording and video conferencing, reading and writing email, instant messaging, playing media, data storage, browsing the internet and using social media.
• Tablets were preferred for blogging, presenting and reading eBooks.  (eReaders also scored highly for this).  Many teachers commented that they used their phones and tablets interchangeably to do many tasks: browsing the internet, note taking and playing games scored almost as highly for tablets as for smartphones.
• Netbooks were preferred for polling and for quizzes and tests.

We will survey our middle and high school teachers the week after next and I'm curious to see how the results compare with those of elementary.

Photo Credit:  New Addition by THEMACGIRL, 2008