The first practical example below, ‘mobile ethnographies of learning in the wild’, describes the use of a
head-mounted camera and SMDs (iPhone) to stay in-world with participants during ethnographic
research (Beddall-Hill). The other two examples of practice provided in this paper include the use of
SMDs (iPhones and iPads) for interviews (Jabbar) and design-based research (Al Shehri). Each case
deals with the qualitative examination of learning processes in higher education. The format of this paper
uses the questions posed during the conference session to guide the format and later discussion of the
examples. Each example illustrates the use of SMDs for qualitative research purposes, giving a
description of the research and why particular tools were chosen. They then reflect on what was learnt
from using these tools, drawing out lessons for best practice whilst also considering the applications
found to be most suitable for the tasks. Finally each example concludes by discussing the issues that
were encountered in using these tools. The final section of the paper provides a discussion of the
examples, feedback from conference participants on the issues inherent in using SMDs for data
collection, and comments on potential future use of SMDs in research