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Advances in Social Sciences Research Journal – Vol. 8, No. 9
Publication Date: September 25, 2021
DOI:10.14738/assrj.89.10821. Tomé, J. M. S. (2021). Virtual Education in Chile, An Example of a New Space for Learning. Advances in Social Sciences Research
Journal, 8(9). 363-369.
Services for Science and Education – United Kingdom
Virtual Education in Chile, An Example of a New Space for
Learning
José Manuel Salum Tomé, PhD
Doctor of Education
Catholic University of Temuco
ABSTRACT
The Virtual Education was born in 2002 from a joint project between the Center for
Improvement, Experimentation and Pedagogical Research CPEIP and the Center for
Education and Technology Links. CPEIP has developed a line of distance teacher
training through the Internet running several courses since 2002, and Links during
the last 15 years has dedicated its efforts to provide the access of teachers and
students to educational opportunities associated with new technologies of
Information and communication. Both institutions decided to combine their efforts
and develop a joint project that integrates the CPEIP distance teacher training line,
up to now aimed at curriculum updating, different strategies to support the
appropriation of ICTs and their curricular integration.
Key words: Virtual Education, Virtual Classrooms, ICT Competencies, Digital Literacy.
INTRODUCTION
Virtual education with e-learning and b-learning modality for teacher updating, is an initiative
with coverage throughout the Chilean territory and is financed by the Ministry of Education of
Chile through the Center for Improvement, Experimentation and Pedagogical Research (CPEIP
). It has been developed by the Center for the Development of Innovations in Education. The
training is inserted within the framework of the curricular reform, and incorporates ICT
resources in the learning activities and teacher training.
This modality was born in the context of a line of teacher training with the support of a virtual
component implemented by the CPEIP. On the other hand, a recent study carried out within the
framework of the Links project shows that 92% of the establishments have technological
infrastructure and 76% of the teachers have been trained in the use of ICT, the above as a result
of the implementation of the project Links. On the other hand, penetration in the use of ICT in
teachers is increasing by 80% of teachers with computers at home, 51% of them with Internet,
58% of them with broadband (Collect and Links 2004).
The development and implementation of the experience contemplated: a) the selection and
training of tutors, b) the pedagogical design of the course, c) the design and implementation of
the course on the Moodle platform; d) development of various content support resources, e)
application of Pre and Post Test and summative and formative evaluations.
The course trained 786 teachers nationwide, divided into 29 courses, with an average of 27
students per course. For the tutorial support during the implementation of the course, a
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Advances in Social Sciences Research Journal (ASSRJ) Vol. 8, Issue 9, September-2021
Services for Science and Education – United Kingdom
community of tutors was created to support them in their tasks of tutoring the course in the
areas: administrative, technical, social and pedagogical. The work methodology placed the
teacher at the center of learning, as an apprentice who autonomously defines their learning
path. In this context, the participant builds knowledge through interaction with: the materials,
the tutor and the classmates.
MATERIALS AND METHODS
The development and implementation of the experience included:
The selection and training of tutors, for which the Salmon e-modetaring model was used,
creating activities as learning objects. A profile was designed to select the tutors and they were
trained through a course in the e-learning modality that concluded with a face-to- face meeting .
Pedagogical design of the course , which has been conceived under an interactive model for the
teaching of mathematics whose conception is very close to the expression of the Madison
Project, which is synthesized in: “conjecture - try, put the idea to the test - observe what
happens and ... learn how to continue ”;
Design and implementation of the course on the Moodle platform ; It contemplated the
organization of the contents in units, which have three areas: Activities and Evaluation : it finds
the set of activities organized weekly, within the week by day and within the day, the specific
activities with a brief description and time development estimate, considers a weekly formative
assessment and a grade per unit; Interactions: includes a discussion forum, a space for
consultations and a bulletin board; Library: groups the different resources such as readings,
guides, Applets, reference material .
Development of various support resources contents: guides, reference materials, applets
(component of an application running in the context of another program, for example in a web
browser) , readings, references to sites, among other resources .
The application of a Pre and Post Test: A pre-test was applied at the beginning of the course and
a post-test at the end.
Obtaining and analyzing information such as: statistical data of participation in face-to-face,
evaluations with qualifications on the platform and registration of participations in interactive
spaces on the platform.
RESULTS AND DISCUSSION
In this section the main results of the course are presented, they have been obtained through
the different information registration systems such as: the application of the Pre and Post Test,
attendance at face-to-face sessions, the results of the summative evaluations on the platform
and the data obtained from the platform regarding participation in interactive spaces.
Participation in the course
During every week a monitoring of the active students in the course was carried out, issuing a
weekly report which gives an account of the number of active and inactive students in the week,
in addition to counting those without any connection in the course.
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Tomé, J. M. S. (2021). Virtual Education in Chile, An Example of a New Space for Learning. Advances in Social Sciences Research Journal, 8(9). 363-
369.
URL: http://dx.doi.org/10.14738/assrj.89.10841
In this section the main results of the course are presented, they have been obtained through
the different information registration systems such as: the application of the Pre and Post Test,
attendance at face-to-face sessions, the results of the summative evaluations on the platform
and the data obtained from the platform regarding participation in interactive spaces.
Participation in the course
During every week a monitoring of the active students in the course was carried out, issuing a
weekly report which gives an account of the number of active and inactive students in the week,
in addition to counting those without any connection in the course. Figure 7 shows the behavior
of these parameters in the 14 weeks of course execution.
Participation in Face-to-Face Sessions
The course includes three face-to-face sessions, at the beginning, at the end of the course and
after the first content unit. For the development of these face-to-face sessions, the tutor was
given a plan to follow with the activities to be developed and digital resources as a presentation
for their support.
Participation in Face-to-Face Sessions
The course includes three face-to-face sessions, at the beginning, at the end of the course and
after the first content unit. For the development of these face-to-face sessions, the tutor was
given a plan to follow with the activities to be developed and digital resources as a presentation
for their support.
Participation of exchange spaces
This section will analyze the participation of the participants in the various asynchronous
spaces contemplated for communication between the tutor with the students and between the
participants themselves.
Participation in permanent spaces
The permanent spaces are a set of tools mainly forums that are available for use by participants
throughout the course.
165 technical questions are presented an average of 5.5 per course. These doubts are related to
the use of the platform and the configuration of the computers to run certain applications such
as Applets.
In the social forum there are 765 topics opened by the participants, within them there are
different levels of interaction that are difficult to quantify, the average is 26.3 open topics per
course, remember that these topics are initiated and encouraged by the participants
themselves, existing null or void. little participation of the tutor, except in the welcome forum
that the tutor starts in this space. The social forum becomes a kind of " virtual teachers room ".
In news, space restricted to publications only by the tutor that cannot be debated by the
participants, 624 interventions were recorded with an average of 21.5 interventions. These
correspond to information and guidance that tutors send to their students regarding the
development of activities, the rendering of evaluations and evaluation criteria, among others.