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Introduction

21 January, 2016 - 14:46

The continuous changes that are occurring in society today because of advances in science and technology require new models and social patterns to be developed and implemented in many fields, a prominent one of which is that of education (Barberá et al., 2008; Coll, 2004; Garrison & Anderson, 2003). We are living in what is often called the Information Age, and which has been evolving into the so-called Knowledge Society. According to Crook (Crook, 1996), education needs to be re-thought in depth to adapt to this new kind of society characterized by knowledge, information, and communication. Indeed, these innovations are already bringing about the birth of a new type of education supported by the widespread diffusion of Information and Communication Technologies (ICTs).

There has been growing research interest in studying the impact of ICTs on educational processes, in parallel with the growing adoption of these technologies at all levels of teaching and learning (Coll et al., 2008). Some authors (Bajarlía & Spiegel, 1997) have noted that students maintain a constant relationship with the technologies that they have grown up with, which allows one to observe the progress of their learning using interactive media, monitoring how, and how much, they learn. In this sense, ICTs in education are seen from two perspectives: learning with them and learning from them (Finol de Govea, 2007). Some authors (Järvelä & Häkkinen, 2002; Kennewell & Beauchamps, 2003; Squires & McDougall, 1994; Tondeur et al., 2007; Twining, 2002) have studied empirically the way in which teachers and students use ICTs in the actual development of the practical work they do in class. This influence of ICTs on education has been investigated by many other authors (Balanskat et al., 2007; Cabero et al., 2003; Cattagni & Farris, 2001; Cebrián, et al., 2007), and indeed is the subject of the work to be described in this chapter which deals with the particular processes of teaching and learning in either purely virtual environments or in presential environments that include new educational materials using ICTs. Some research (Chi et al., 2001; Lehtinen et al., 1999) has focused on such aspects as the teacher's role, the learning undertaken by students in these new environments, or how knowledge is actually constructed using these new virtual tools (Arvaja et al., 2007). Other authors (Beller, 1998) have discussed the importance of integrating ICTs into teaching and learning to make the process more effective. This has led to the emergence of e-learning as an important innovative platform for teaching.

Some research (Yazón et al., 2002) indicates that the use of technology promotes a differentway of thinking about teaching and learning provided that it is genuinely student-centredlearning, and not treated just as a simple reprise of the "old model" (directed by the teacher) in a new technological environment (Harris, 1999). Others (Coll et al., 2007) note that some authors (Blease & Cohen, 1990; Squires & McDougall, 1994; Twining, 2002) propose directing effort to studying how ICTs are transforming teaching practices.

In recent years, one of the major lines of research has been on how ICTs can be integrated into the teaching and learning process. There have been various studies considering a variety of forms of integration. For some authors (M. Grabe & C. Grabe, 1996), ICT integration should be undertaken as an extension of the traditional teaching process, not as a complete replacement. For others authors (Merrill et al., 1996), for the result to be an enhancement of learning, integration will have to imply a combination of ICTs with traditional teaching procedures, a combination known as "blended learning" or b-learning, designed to move the student to a new level of understanding. According to Gros (Gros, 2000), one form of successfully integrating technology into the curricula is to regularly use ICTs for information, experimenting, simulating, or communicating. This author therefore goes beyond the mere instrumental use of the tool to focus on the content that the students will be taught (Gros, 2000). Other authors have shown the importance of ICTs after assessing the educational possibilities they represent in an objectives-based framework (Reparaz et al., 2000), and accept the need for a change in the roles of both teacher and student (Adell, 1997; Bartolomé, 1996; Cebrián, 1997; Poves, 1997; Reparaz et al., 2000; Roca, 2001; Sánchez, 2000, 2001). While some point out that it is the curriculum which guides the use of ICTs, and not the other way round (Dockstader, 1999), others argue that they should be introduced so as to provoke educational innovation (Dede, 1998; Gros, 2000). For example, both teachers and students are found to be eager to appropriate ICTs into their teaching and learning activities (Area, 2005; Cuban, 2001; Zhao et al., 2002; Zhao & Frank, 2003), facilitating the implementation of innovations.

The use of ICTs allows one to count on a new way to organize, represent, or simulate reality, being effective tools to help achieve a high degree of application of the knowledge acquired in class. Since they allow students to work in collaboration, to use virtual laboratories, display laboratory experiments over the Internet or on their mobiles, they are an excellent resource for learning both concepts and procedures. Indeed, these features make ICTs an especially useful tool for science teaching in general, and physics in particular. For these reasons, the integration of ICTs into science education is emerging as an essential element of the so-called knowledge society. There also stands out the optimal conditions such integration would present for constructivist learning. In recent years, many researchers have explored the role technology can play in constructivist learning, demonstrating that computers provide an appropriate environment for students to express themselves and show that they have acquired new knowledge. From this perspective, technological factors can serve as teaching tools to foster the construction of knowledge (Vélez, 2002).

For Coll (Coll et al., 2007), ICTs reveal their greatest mediating capacity as "psychological instruments" when they are actually used as "cognitive instruments" (Lajoie et al., 1998; Lajoie, 2000; Lajoie & Azevedo, 2006; Salomón et al., 1991) or "tools of the mind" (Jonassen, 1996, 2000), i.e., when they are used so that the student has to establish meaningful connections with the content being studied. However, ICTs are not cognitive tools in themselves. Rather, they are technological tools which, due to the properties of the environments that they make it possible to create,processes involved in teaching and learning.

In this vein, we believe that ICTs are currently stimulating the emergence of new approaches to the organization of education in the European Higher Education Area (EHEA) from the standpoints of both research and teaching. For example, one of the most significant current initiatives being developed in almost all areas of study is that of virtual learning platforms or e-learning. To properly implement the teaching process in these new learning environments, one must have appropriate educational materials available that can serve as the fundamental support for the new methods of teaching and learning. These materials themselves can be developed and shared through ICTs.

The work to be presented is centred on the subject of Optoelectronics, a subject that we teach in the second cycle of the degree in Electronics Engineering at the School of Industrial Engineering of the University of Extremadura (Spain). The overall objective was to create educational tools for university education in optoelectronics designed for application on e-learning platforms. Within this overall objective, our aim was to design, prepare, validate, and apply teaching materials from a conceptual, experimental, and didactic perspective.

Figure 9.1 is a concept map that summarizes the core of this work: the use of ICTs to design and create teaching tools that can be implemented together in the form of a virtual laboratory. With the design and development of such virtual laboratories, students have a system available with which to carry out a study analogous to what could be done with a real system. This has allowed university laboratories to go beyond the physical limits imposed by the traditional means available to them in teaching certain subjects (Aktan et al., 1996; Calvo et al., 2009; Candelas et al., 2004; Domínguez et al., 2005; Dormido, 2004; Guzmán et al., 2005; Laschi & Riccioni, 2008; Riccioni 2010; Salzmann et al., 2000; Yanitelli, 2011).

Specifically, as shown in Figure 9.1, in the present work:

  • We have designed, developed, and validated techniques for structuring information, using for this purpose Concept Maps and the CmapTools software tool to construct, store, and share them. We include learning materials to facilitate the students' learning of the technique of constructing these maps.
  • We have studied the latest developments in the field of information communication,such as optical communications, fibre optics, and other optoelectronic devices. We have designed, developed, and validated content that can be shared through ICTs.
  • We include learning materials to facilitate the students' construction of new content of this type. This content is as diverse as concept maps, computer simulations (which have evolved from analogue to digital and hyper-realistic), videos of laboratory practicals, multimedia video-tutorials, Web pages, explanations using presentation software, etc.

The originality of our work is that it combines the "hard" science part (such as the study of optical fibres or of the software with which to perform hyper-realistic simulations) with techniques of structuring and organizing information (a part which is more typical of other disciplines closer to the social sciences). The methodology employed in this work is based on the Theory of Meaningful Learning (Ausubel, 1968, 2002) and the Elaboration Theory of Instruction (Reigeluth, 1983) with the modifications put forward by our research group (Pérez et al., 1999, 2004). These theories have guided us in how we design, elaborate, and put into practice a learning process characterized by the use of the new technologies. In ICTs: Use in the elaboration of teaching materials for science education we make our proposal on the theoretical framework used to develop new educational materials that employ ICTs. Subsequently, in Computer simulations: ICT tools to facilitate meaningful learning, Instructional videos: ICT tools to facilitate meaningful learning and Concept maps: ICT tools to facilitate meaningful learning we use this proposal on the development of simulations, instructional videos and concept maps. Finally, in the concluding section we show the results of the application in the classroom of these new educational materials developed, and provide a summary of future work.

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Figure 9.1 Concept map showing the focus of our research