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The current study demonstrates how blended learning using location-based mobile-learning experiences can be improved when student preparation is enhanced with techniques informed by the theory of Mediated Learning Experience (MLE). Our experiment used a sample of 216 junior-high students within the context of school field trips. Tablet computers were custom configured to implement mobile learning with an application dispensing both contextual content and field navigation assignments. A control group prepped for the field trips used traditional information and discussion while an experimental group prepped based on the principles of MLE. Following the experience, students’ subjective perceptions of transactional distance were examined. The findings suggested that those prepared with MLE principles experienced lower transactional distances and, hence, a better outcome. Additionally, gender and thinking style differences were found, highlighting the need to further adapt flexible teaching approaches in mobile-learning environments. Overall, the findings carry significant implications for pedagogic and technological aspects of implementing mobile technologies in education.

As increasing numbers of educational institutions implement distance learning (DL) programs, educators need to know how teaching and learning processes change when teachers and learners are no longer in the same place at the same time. Understanding the theoretical and practical implications of these changes can help teachers to compensate learners for the limitations that often characterize a DL environment. In this article, we describe how we used content analysis to identify how university lecturers' verbal and nonverbal dialogue patterns changed when they taught in both conventional and DL environments. Data, indicating significant cross-context changes in teacher-student interaction patterns, validate Moore's (1972, 1993) transactional distance theory. This theory predicts that the increased psychological and communicative space, which needs to be crossed in a DL environment, has a potentially negative effect on teaching and learning. Empirical evidence of changes in specific categories of interaction also expands the conceptualization of the dialogue variable in Moore's theory. The focus of this article on verbal dialogue and nonverbal interactions was intended to clarify possible causes and effects of increased transactional distance in a DL environment. Our integrated analysis of verbal and nonverbal interactions was intended to identify types of compensatory strategies adopted by teachers in an attempt to reduce transactional distance. Teachers could use these results to manage the dialogue variable more effectively in both DL and conventional learning environments.