Date of Award

11-2019

Document Type

Dissertation

Degree Name

Master of Education (MEd)

First Supervisor/Advisor

Dr. Fredrick Mtenzi

Second Supervisor/Advisor

Dr. Shelina Walli

Department

AKU-East Africa

Abstract

Over a decade, mobile phone technology has been expanding Worldwide and Africa in particular. In Tanzania like other countries, mobile phones have taken their position among the Millennial and Generation Z who are learners in secondary schools, colleges, and Universities. The main use of mobile phones in these cohorts is basically communication and Internet searches. Due to this popularity, there is a need to explore how teachers view this group of mobile phone users in relation to the use of Mobile phones in teaching and learning. This study seeks to explore the views of teachers on the use of mobile phones in teaching and learning in a secondary school in Sumbawanga Municipal in the Rukwa region. The mixed-methods research was employed in this study by using concurrent parallel mixed research design where both qualitative and quantitative research was carried out at the same time. The data were collected by using interviews and questionnaires where 4 teachers were interviewed and 24 teachers were given questionnaires. To arrive at findings, interviews were analyzed qualitatively by transcribing, coding, categorizing and thematizing while the questionnaires were analyzed using SPSS Statistics 21 software. Both qualitative and quantitative results reveal that teachers use mobile phones through communication and internet search as basic uses and use little in teaching and learning. Also, teachers perceived that unclear policy on mobile phone use; teachers’ attitudes and poor infrastructure do limit the acceptance of mobile phones in teaching and learning. Teachers also suggest that providing mobile use education to teachers and learners, guiding learners on how to use mobile phones smartly and improving infrastructures are key measures to be taken into account in order to use mobile phones effectively for pedagogical purposes. The study recommends that future researches should be done to explore the views of teachers in Rural Secondary schools where teachers are not used to computers but possess mobile phones. Also, this study suggests that research on other educational stakeholders such as parents, learners and government officials should be done in order to see their views before coming up with the mobile phone policy for teaching and learning.

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