In a study* that I co-authored, the design, and translator-friendliness of the Mobile Phone Dictionary (MPD), and trainee translators' needs in using the MPD were investigated and explored. A questionnaire survey and interviews were conducted with 342 translation students at the sub-degree level in Hong Kong in 2010. The following are two of the discussion results with special pedagogical relevance to language teachers.
First, already the third most frequently used among translation students, the MPD has become a preferred form of dictionary. As with the shift from printed dictionaries to Pocket Electronic Dictionaries (PED), the use of the MPD is, again, student-led. Teachers should keep themselves informed of the latest development of MPDs, and provide students with instructions on PED/MPD use. Students who are lacking in dictionary use skills will find similar problems with the MPD. Besides, almost all students did not have any training of MPD skills. With the advance of technology, students are provided with more and more hi-tech reference tools; yet, the training of dictionary skills makes little progress, lagging farther and farther behind the needs. The training vacuum ever remains, leaving students to explore the skills by trial and error almost all through the years.
Second, some MPDs are only for cursory use, not for professional or academic use. This should be pointed out to students, a concept about when to employ the right reference tools, given their design for specific purposes and levels. This should help students to become more efficient users, to avoid frustrations over information not found and over-reliance on the tool. Another concept to be installed should be the measurement of efficiency. Many MPD users only took the time in finding the word entry into consideration, while efficiency in dictionary use should be measured by the time to obtain the desired information. If they often fail to find the word entry or the right definition from the MPDs, and need to turn to another dictionary, it already lowers the efficiency. They should be trained to enhance their meta-cognitive awareness to evaluate the look-up itself.
With a new form of dictionary, a pedagogy for dictionary skills needs to be developed, including the know-how, and the way it can be incorporated into the overall training of dictionary competence. In addition, the concern of the effectiveness of this new tool to language learning is yet to be fully addressed.
*Co-authored with Li, Ka-leung (2011). Mobile phone dictionary: Friend or foe? A user attitude survey of Hong Kong translation students. In K. Akasu, & S. Uchida (Eds.), Lexicography: Theoretical and Practical Perspectives—Papers Submitted to the Seventh ASIALEX Biennial International Conference, Kyoto, Japan, 22 - 24 August 2011, pp. 303 – 312.