Abstract:

Currently, the Virtual Learning Environments (VLEs) are commonly used in Higher Education for supporting teaching-learning processes. The University of Murcia has been using a VLE during the last ten years. However, the first-year students usually are not used to utilize a VLE. The aim of the present work was to evaluate the ease-of-use of a VLE for the First-year Veterinary Students (University of Murcia), according to the students’ point of view. The present research was carried out during the course 2009/2010. Thus, 43 Veterinary Students from the first-year (University of Murcia) were polled. The survey was conducted during the second term of the course. To evaluate the easy-of-use 4 items were measured, using a Likert scale, from 1 to 6. Thus, 2 items were connected with the “format” of the information provided and the other 2 with the VLE “usability”. Data analysis was performed using several statistical tests. According to the results obtained, the format reached a value of 8.56 (SD=1.62) and the usability a 9.00 (SD=1.53) out of 12 points, respectively. In conclusion, the easy-of-use of the University of Murcia VLE, according to the First-year Veterinary Students’ point of view, was high.

Keywords:

Virtual Learning Environments, Information and Communication Technologies, Higher Education.