Development of a WAP-Based Mobile Learning Environment for Distance
Education Students
Abstract: This paper presents design and implementation of a mobile learning system aimed
for an educational environment. This system provides complete teaching resources, which can
be accessed by the learners through the mobile. It focuses on the mobility of the learning
practice, flexibility and emphasizes the interaction between the learner and learning content.
System users are categorized into three categories: administrators, instructors and students.
Different learning activates can be carried out throughout the system concerning tracing
learning courses, engaging all practitioners in the learning process, providing versatile mobile
learning management processes, offering necessary communication tools to allow the users to
communicate with each other through forums, SMS and e-mails. Wireless Application
Protocol (WAP) is adopted as a solution for the system platform providing satisfactory
telecommunication services on mobile learning system. To support system maintainability and
scalability, modular design has been devised. Integrating constituent modules provide a fullfledged mobile learning system.
Introduction
Mobile Learning (m-Learning) refers to the use of mobile and handheld IT devices, such as Personal Digital
Assistants (PDAs), mobile telephones, notebook PCs, tablet PCs, pocket PCs, iPods and any handheld device that
has some form of wireless connectivity, in teaching and learning. Since mobile devices can be carried anywhere,
learning is available to the user in a ubiquitous fashion (Shih-Hung et al. 2010). The role of new mobile technologies
is to facilitate and promote learning, encourage alternatives through the acquisition of knowledge, the desire to
discover, find, understand and assimilate the concepts and ideas to shape an appropriate educational system. Mobile
learning is not only the use of mobile technology to support learning, but it is accompanied with an emphasis on
teaching and learning tasks to enrich learning methods. Mobile learning involves connectivity for downloading,
uploading and/or online working via wireless networks, mobile phone networks or both, and linking to institutional
systems e.g. virtual learning environments (VLEs) and management information systems (MIS) (Yazhen & Jian,
2011).
M-Learning is a technology with a huge potential to be used in distance learning (Munirah et al. 2010). MLearning has been used significantly among different projects which aimed to exploit this technology in formal
education, such as supplements to courses (Boaz & Edna 2005, Ahmed et al. 2012), collaborative m-learning (Ng et
al. 2011), micro-blogging (yunpeng 2011), distribution of learning materials, such as test questions or questionnaires
to mobile terminals (El-Sofany 2009), adaptation of educational contents to mobile devices (Garcia et al. 2011), and
construction of learning resources under cloud environment (Jian 2010). As well several works addressed informal
education, i.e. visits to museums, tourist sites, and geographical locations around the world (Inoue 2006), and
ambient learning (Gu 2010).
The focus of this work is to develop an environment for m-learning system that can provide learners with
the maximizing learning autonomy, and also provides the instructors and education administrators with more
flexible teaching and managing methods.
System Overview
A mobile learning environment is developed to comprise three interacting components. Education web server
provides learning services and manages the system. The Communication network (GPRS and Wi-Fi), is used by the
users of the mobile learning system to get connection to the education web server through Internet. Mobile phones
are the communication terminal devices that are used to interface to the system and mobile learning platform.
M-learning platform is based on providing learning resources and services to the different users (students,
instructors and administrators) according to given privileges. This system is based on the Wireless Access Protocol
(WAP) two-layer architecture: WAP phone, and WAP server. WAP is an effective way of communicating
information and educational materials to users because the WAP is accessible from a variety of wireless and
handheld devices.
WAP phones are user terminals including the smart phone and PDA, used by users to access the developed
m-learning system. WAP phones must support WAP 2.0/ XHTML, active WAP /mobile Internet service (GPRS and
Wi-Fi) and can play multimedia as 3GP, MP3 and MP4. A WAP server, in this work, is the education web server
that comprises 4 types of servers interacting to support the learning services provided by system. The Mobile
Application server manages the learning services provided by the developed website. The File server receives the
uploading learning resources from instructors and it is managed by the administrator. The Database server stores and
manages detailed records and tables related to the users and learning resources. And finally the Web server allows
the users to search for the external websites and services. System components interaction is shown in figure 1.
Figure 1. System Components Interaction
The user needs to specify a URL address of the Mobile Learning website by the WAP phone to access the
WAP education server. Through the Wi-Fi network or GPRS the user sends a request to interact with the mobile
application server over HTTP protocol. When the mobile application server receives the requesting information
from the WAP phone, it analyzes the original datum, and transfers it into an XML style. This XML information is
sent to the database server or web server. When the database server or the web responds, the mobile application
server put the contents into files in the style of XHTML which are relayed back to the user's WAP phone screen for
the convenience of the user.
M-learning System Users and Functionality
The m-learning system allows three different types of users to interact with the system according to given
privileges. They are the administrator, instructor and student. Each of them can login in the system in a related
identity, possessing different operating authority and functions. This is illustrated in figure 2.
Administrator Subsystem
The administrator subsystem plays an important role in keeping the system management. This subsystem
provides the administrator with web-based services to manage the information of the m-learning system and other
services provided by system. These are instructor information, student information, learning resources and college
information management.
Instructor Subsystem
Instructor primary goal in the m-learning system is to provide a learning course, evaluate students, send notes
by SMS or e-mail, add questions for the online exams, give students online exams and manage the database of
questions. This subsystem provides the instructor with web-based tools to manage the information required.
Figure 2. System Users and Their Functionality
Students Subsystem
The m-learning system is originally intended for student. They can view and use the bulk of system services
as downloading the learning course, carrying on online exams and viewing college information. Other services
special to students are used to evaluate the learning operations. The students can inquire the administrator or
instructor by the email or Question and Answer (Q&A) service.
M-Learning System Structure
The system structure is illustrated in figure 3.The mobile learning system is designed to have three layers;
they are data layer, business logic layer and the presentation layer. The presentation layer is built in the client, while
the business logic layer and data layer are built in the education server.
Data Layer
Figure 3. Mobile Learning
System Structure
It is located on the database server. It contains the data processing logic. Its main task is to receive requesting
information from the web server, then complete the function of querying, refreshing and changing data in the
database. Thereafter, it returns the results to the web server (Business Logic Layer).
Data layer provides data sources for the applications of the m-learning system. It includes user information tables,
learning resource tables, teaching database, report and tutorial sheet database, and questions database.
Business Logic Layer
Business logic layer is the main part of the whole m-learning system. The services of the learning system are
encapsulated in this layer. It has the responsibility to deal with the application requests of the presentation layer and
to make logical estimation of the result. If the logical estimation is legal then the data is invoked by the system from
database, data is processed and then the results are returned to the presentation layer. There are eight functional
modules in the business logic layer of the m-learning system which are discussed in the next section.
Presentation Layer
The presentation layer is an interactive interface between users and the system. Its responsibility is to deal
with the dialog between users and system. The client could be in the form of smart mobile phone or a PDA.
For the modules using application programs of a smart device, the client software is mainly client application
programs of the mobile equipment operating systems and browsers. Users visit the mobile learning system server
through the browsers and return the data to the browser according to their requests. The communication between
users and results is implemented by running XHTML and JavaScript in browsers. The presentation layer provides
separate different user interfaces for students, instructors and administrators.
Functional Modules
M -learning system business layer comprises eight functional modules. Integrating these modules provides
the full-fledged learning system.
Mobile Learning Management System (mLMS) Module
The designed system is categorized into two levels of services which are the foreground and background. The
foreground comprises services that do not require management. These are composed of application programs related
to smart devices and the web application programs of browsers. While the background services are the core
functions managed by the mLMS. Administrators and instructors log into the system to manage these services. The
mobile Learning Management System (mLMS) provides several tasks which are summarized as:
 Overall Framework Support: The mLMS provides different types of contents on different smart devices
creating a comfortable learning environment for mobile learners.
 Course Content Presentation: The mLMS is able to archive course content, provide easy navigation,
browsing and upload or download of the report file and tutorial sheet to present educational materials
convenient to mobile devices.
 Management Learning Courses: This task is responsible for managing learning courses, users, and files. It
provides and performs functions for both instructors and students.
 Access to Courseware: The mLMS is provide access to online resources namely references, glossaries,
exams, databases, and the course planning tools and calendars.
Course Learning Module
The aim of this module is to provide learning through different activities via mobile terminals. These
methods of mobile learning are characterized by being versatile, spontaneous and portable. That is the functions
provided by course learning are including mobile learning resource online browsing, mobile learning resource local
operation and learning resource download. In addition, the instructors can upload mobile learning resources, and
administrators manage the mobile learning resources which include deleting the previous upload course or
modifying access authority.
Teaching and Management Module
The teaching and management module provides the following functions:
 Functions for Students
 Selecting courses online.
 Students plan.
 Receive evaluation.
 Receive the notices of teaching activities.
 Functions for Instructors
 Uploading new courses.
 Managing the information concerning students’ courses selection.
 Modifying courses information.
 Receiving the system information.
 Managing of students’ evaluation.
 Functions for Administrators
 Managing the instructors’ applications.
 Managing curricula.
 Managing students’ courses selection.
 Issuing the system news.
 Manage students’ grades.
 Evaluation of learning process (questioner).
Mobile Educational Training Module
The mobile educational training module can provide the following functions:
 Functions for Students
 Providing online testing and practice.
 Giving feedback and scores.
 Recording grades and the learning process information.
 Functions for Instructors and Administrators
 Setting and upload test and practice.
 Analyzing grades and the learning process information.
Questions &Answers Module
This module provides the following functions:
 Functions for Students:
 Forum service: allowing students to query instructors.
 Glossaries: allowing student to be informed about the meaning of an acronym or term.
 Browsing questions and answers.
 Functions for Instructors and Administrators
 The instructor can browse and answer students’ questions.
 Enquiries requested by the instructors can be answered through the email or short messages (SMS) by
administrators.
Communication Module
This module allows the users of the m-learning system communicate with each other. It provides access to
asynchronous communication tools namely email, and Short Messages Service (SMS) to allow disseminating
information as notices concerning grades and assignments.
Profile Setting Module
This module allows the users to sent and change personal profile such as user account, e-mail and other
personal information.
Evaluation Module
This module allows the students to participate in evaluation the learning operation through voting and
questioner. Through voting option the student can evaluate understanding specific lecture or learning recourse while
through the questioner the student can evaluate a related instructor course.
Database
Database constitutes a core element in the m-learning system design. The learning system comprises detailed
records and tables related to users and learning courses. In addition processed data concerning students learning and
instructors are managed in the database. The Database Management System (DBMS) used is MySQL server 5.0.
Java Database Connectivity (JDBC) is deployed to access a MySQL database, and the applied JDBC driver for
MySQL is MySQL Connector/J.
The database design incorporates the tables of records and the relationships among tables. Tables in mlearning system can be classified in to five categories: question and answer, learning resource, evaluation, teaching
information, and users’ information.
tables.
Implementation
This work was conducted using different mobile phones for learning through the developed prototype
realizing system architecture shown in figure 1. The system test was carried out in actual environment. The mlearning system platform does not require the installation and run of special programs in mobile device to access to
the services and learning resources. However, all what it requires is a mobile device supporting WAP 2.0/XHTL,
active mobile Internet services GPRS and Wi-Fi, and support of 3GP, MP4 and MP3 to play media content. System
platform design and implementation has been based on state of the programming environment and technical tools.
XHTML and Java script are applied to design web pages, JSP and Java Bean are used to program web pages, and
the website for m-learning system has been hosted through tomcat and MySQL server technology.
A fundamental challenge facing the m-learning implementation is the inherent constraints of mobile device
display. This problem has been overcome by dividing the users of the system into three categories (administrator,
instructor and student). Services for each user itself are divided into the different parts and each menu offers certain
type of subservices. Figure 4 illustrates snapshots of some system function menus offered by the system to
administrator, instructor and student.
The WAP application includes dynamic WAP pages generated by servlet modules and navigation database
facilities. Each request follows a standard pattern. First, any request for a WAP page from the mobile device is
passed to a servlet. Secondly, a servlet triggers appropriate requests to the database and retrieves relevant data.
Thirdly, a dynamic WAP page is created and sent back to the mobile device.
a
b
c
Figure 4. Snapshots of Some System Sub-Menus: (a) Administrator, (b) Instructor, (c) Student
Conclusions
A mobile learning system has been designed to comprise comprehensive learning services, requirements of
teaching and management for different categories of users (administrator, instructor and student).
M-learning system platform can support all kinds of devices such as smart mobile phones, PDAs, and various types
of portable computers. The platform can exchange and share information with users from existing resources on the
server via the Internet throughout the developed website. The system platform does not require the installation and
run of special programs in mobile devices to access the services and learning resources.
The platform is embedded with the SMS technology on mobile phones, so it can exploit the functions of SMS
notification and reminding, which increases the flexibility of the system.
The developed system is based on WAP 2.0 as a layer for connecting mobile learning applications with different
mobile networks and operating systems without noticing mobility awareness. It adjusts to fluctuation in bandwidth
and resulting delays, and changes in learner location in the applications. The implemented technical environment
can provide interoperability on different operating platforms.
A work is planned to develop an adaptive style in m-learning system as sending the content to a learner
following his or her interests, adjusting the level to suit the learner’s proficiency level and adapting the system to his
or her learning style.
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