Abstract:

One of the strategies included in the European Higher Education Area makes emphasis on making the students become an active element in the learning process that is associated with the different education competencies [Romero-Lopez, 2007]. In this sense, substantial efforts must be made in teaching to modify the teaching strategies regarding the procedures for communication and distribution of the learning materials [Abdell, 1997].

The goal of this work is to develop, implement and evaluate the use of a virtual laboratory for learning in networks, communications systems and services, which can facilitate the teaching-learning process in subjects that are currently taught in the studies on Telecommunications Engineering and Telecommunications Engineering.

The implementation of the virtual laboratory suggested in this project has the following advantages:

- Students can work with autonomy what facilitates the independent and active learning. They can schedule their work according to their own needs, at work or at home, making more flexible the learning process.
- It promotes teamwork, as some of the exercises require the collaboration of several students who must work cooperatively to solve the problem.
- The virtual lab allows the use of tools and equipment remotely what can derive in a better usage of these resources and makes the associated investment be more profitable.

Virtual lab seeks the following objectives:

- Improve the quality of the educational process using the possibilities offered by the current information technologies and involving the student as an active element.
- Develop tools that allow interacting with the students and help them to understand the subjects’ fundamental concepts.

The proposed platform will consist of a framework composed of:

- Electronic tutorials on the different subjects.
- User and administration guides for the use and access to the virtual lab.
- Applications for the virtualization of the networking devices that are available in the laboratory.
- Diverse simulations of the systems, communications networks and services.

References:
[Abdell J., 1997] Abdell, J. “Tendencias en educación en la sociedad de las tecnologías de la información”. EDUTEC, nº 7, 1997.
[Romero-López M.A., 2007] Romero López, M.A. “Desarrollo de Competencias a través de actividades de clase”, University of Jaen, 2007.

Keywords:

Virtual lab, learning in networks, comunications systems, services.