Los nuevos medios y los jóvenes universitarios

El Entorno Virtual de Aprendizaje ENVIA

Abstract

Public universities in Mexico can and should establish hemselves as on-line education service providers. Beyond that, we find the challenge of applying new information technologies to the classroom for the enrichment of the traditional teaching-learning environment. This includes taking advantage of the experience using IT that today’s young students carry with them when they arrive at the university for the first time. In Mexico today, most students that have access to university studies also have access to computers and internet. Many of the applications they are familiar with have to do with entertainment. We propose to use those abilities developed for entertainment and apply them within a teaching-learning environment. This will develop new professional skills required of the future graduates. The internet (world wide web) enables new media and methods of communication. Users now have access to millions of new media, in contrast to the monopolies or restricted access of former times. These media involve the discovery of new tools and professions such as data miners; specialized users of browsers and searchers. While access to the net is still restricted, an ever greater number and variety of groups are taking advantage of the potential of new technology. University students are among these new groups; many of them have grown up with new technologies, including the internet, as part of their everyday environment. One of the most appealing features of the internet is that it allows people to communicate. There are indications that rather than isolating people and preventing them from partaking of common experiences, this new technology offers a way that people can sharethese experiences. The Universidad Autónoma Metropolitana-Xochimilco, through its Department of Continuing Education and Distance Learning and Campus Computing Services, began three years ago to develop a Virtual Learning Environment (ENVIA in Spanish). Conceived to support the distance learning system, the ENVIA has also become a support to the modular on-campus system. It capitalizes on many of the technology skills that today’s students have built up using entertainment technology, while it helps them develop strengths that will be useful in their future professional lives.