Defense News Features ICT’s DICE-T and Todd Richmond in Mobile Learning Stories

Defense News covered mobile learning applications in two recent articles. Todd Richmond, director of advanced prototype development and transition at ICT, was quoted in both stories discussing the benefits and challenges involved in developing such applications.
“Some of the first solutions were people taking PowerPoint briefs, burning them on to PDFs, putting that on a tablet, and calling it mobile learning. I don’t call that mobile learning,” said Richmond. “Some things are intuitive on a tablet, but others aren’t.”
ICT’s Dismounted Interactive Counter-IED Environment for Training, or DICE-T, a training game that runs on a PC-based server but that users can play on their Android tablets was featured as well.
“I will never get out of a tablet the immersiveness I can get out of a head-mounted display or a multiperson network,” Richmond said. “But mobile lets you do it anywhere, anytime.”
The second story in Defense News discussed whether mobile applications provide effective learning, noting that with so many thousands of options available it can be difficult to sort the good from the bad. Richmond said his gut feeling is that what a user gets out of mobile learning depends on the user.
“If you have a user that is comfortable with a tablet or a smartphone, they will be more willing to put up with issues and engage with the content,” he said.