Durham, NC - With 340 students in his class on the technical and social aspects of the Internet, computer science professor Owen Astrachan doesn't have much opportunity for one-on-one discussions with students. But with mobile devices, he's spurring another kind of class conversation.

This fall, Astrachan is using Poll Everywhere, an online polling application, to collect responses from students in his class. Students can use their own cell phones to respond to questions during class -- via SMS text, Twitter or the Web -- and Astrachan can view and display the results instantly.

Questions range from simple multiple choice to free-response queries that allow longer answers. Participation in the polls is worth 5 percent of each student's grade.

"We can't have a discussion per se in that big a class, but this is one way to foster back-and-forth interaction between me and the class," Astrachan said.

This is just one way that Duke faculty are exploring new ways to foster classroom discussion and engagement using the mobile devices students already carry in their pockets.

Astrachan is one of more than 50 faculty experimenting and learning about new technologies in the classroom in this year's Duke Digital Initiative (DDI), a joint effort of the Center for Instructional Technology and the Office of Information Technology.

As part of DDI, a series of faculty discussions this fall focuses on using new technologies in teaching -- from mobile devices to social networking tools such as Twitter.

Handheld devices provide instant, immediate access to a world of information -- and raise new questions about learning in the 21^st century, said CIT consultant Andrea Novicki. The discussions are designed to explore those issues, she said.

"For me, the interesting part is the diverse uses for mobile devices -- not just looking up a quick fact, but also to participate in polling, studying, accessing course material, connecting with instructors and other students in the course, and especially providing access to facts so that students can concentrate on critical thinking and creating rather than memorizing," Novicki said.

"Just-in-time learning" means students may focus less on content retention and more on mastering how to find that information when its needed, said Len White, director of education for the Duke Institute for Brain Sciences.

"Medical students and doctors in residency or fellowship training have probably forgotten a lot of the material they learned, but they still need access to that content," said White, whose neuroanatomy students can use an iPhone/iPod Touch application to learn human brain anatomy. "Devices like this provide access whenever and wherever it's necessary."

Still, faculty say, a key question is how to ensure that the devices are used as a learning tool and don't just wind up being another distraction.

"Technology has outpaced pedagogy," White said. "There are tremendous tools out there, and tremendous opportunity. We can ignore it, or we can see how to make these things instruments of learning. There's some new ground we need to navigate."