There is no organization that can do without information, where information and communication technologies mediate the entire communication process. The use of information generates new knowledge and skills that, in turn, lead to new information-seeking processes that tend to spiral. The university has undergone momentous changes in its history, as it has adapted to the realities of its environment and its time, environment and time that it has itself contributed to transform. The level of university education or higher is decisive for the development of a nation. The University has social tasks to fulfill to achieve the improvement of the society where it is inserted.It is a quintessential knowledge management engine and a key link within the information and knowledge society. The University of the 21st century is a model of the information and knowledge industry that is obliged to assume a new paradigm to guarantee new social commitments, such as continuous learning.
Some theoretical considerations about the use of information and communication technologies in higher education.
The level of university education or higher is decisive for the development of a nation. The University has social tasks to fulfill to achieve the improvement of the society where it is inserted. It is a quintessential knowledge management engine and a key link within the information and knowledge society.
The University of the 21st century is a model of the information and knowledge industry that is obliged to assume a new paradigm to guarantee new social commitments, such as continuous learning.
Cuba, having inherited an unfavorable reality in the field of education with almost a million illiterates, today shows high levels of schooling that allows it to launch the challenge of proposing to universalize knowledge at the highest levels. In practical terms, it means the opportunity to create facilities for all individuals to study without limits, throughout their lives, thus promoting personal enjoyment and the cultured use of free time.
This new Cuban, revolutionary, internationalist, humanistic and scientific university, open to all society - is distinguished from the classical university, basically because it transcends its traditional walls and develops its processes in close relationship with the communities, continually improving them as part of an interaction in which everyone participates.
The University Center of Sancti Spíritus José Martí Pérez with 12 teaching units, university headquarters in the eight municipalities, works on the development of the model of a territorial, universal and sustainable University with the Master Strategy of Informatization: Qualitatively transforming the substantive processes of the Center through advanced and rational use of ICTs, for this it develops the system of specialized virtual libraries and a knowledge management system, in support of teaching and research, efficiently using the scientific journals of the MES placed on the INTERNET as well as Databases and Another resources.
From writing to the Internet
New information and communication technologies have found, in university libraries, a laboratory par excellence, to insert new products and services useful to the entire university community.
A university library is currently characterized by the following elements:
- Integration of printed, digitized and virtual collections. Existence of online catalogs and databases. Integration of the library in cooperation projects. Intensive use of networks. Creation of virtual platforms for the insertion of the main information resources. Generation of value added services and information analysis. Development of an information culture in the university context.
The change in the library, within universities, powered by the strength of information and communication technologies will involve:
- Reconfigure the classic library scheme. Transform work dynamics based on knowledge management. Expand value-added services. Include the library within the productive chain of universities. Achieve intensive and perfect use of networks. Develop information products and services with the use of new information technologies. Diversify collections in different formats and make them accessible from different points. Extend the university's information resources to all training, improvement and continuous learning activities..
The library has selectively used the technology of its time, but, since the appearance of electronic technology, innovation and the development of information and communication technologies, it has been forced to change and / or create its activities and services based on the technology itself, but as a means to enhance and optimize the quality of services and access to information. If it does not innovate and develop to meet the demands of today's society, the library would be at risk of being expendable.
There is a close relationship between information and the technologies for its treatment, which can be seen in the following postulates:
Information as the basis of knowledge implies an transformation of knowledge and not only a passive and data-receiving attitude.
From writing to the INTERNET, man has done nothing but help himself with the means to communicate and transmit knowledge.
Technologies for the treatment of information are the means that man uses to transmit this knowledge.
According to its etymology the word technology comes from two Greek words: Teckne (TEXUN) technique or art whose meaning among the Greeks was that of power or ability, habit or ability, the intellectual virtue of a man to make the product or art and logos (nç) word meaning proposition or speech. The meaning that the Greeks gave to the previous words can be said that "technology is the study of knowing how to do things, the knowledge of the means to achieve certain ends"
According to the definitions of Technologies that have been offered, they are diverse. Gilbert et al. Refer to the "set of tools, supports and channels for the treatment and access to information". For his part, Bartolomé (1989), from an open perspective, points out that his expression refers to the latest technological developments and their applications.
Castells and others indicate that "they comprise a series of scientific discovery applications whose central core consists in an increasing capacity for information processing". And finally, to cite the one formulated in the publication of the magazine "Culture and New Technologies" of the Processes Exhibition, organized in Madrid by the Ministry of Culture: "… new supports and channels to shape, register, store and disseminate informational content. ”.
Every day more university teaching will have to respond to diverse teaching-learning situations, ranging from conventional situations to non-contact teaching. A possible response to these situations is open learning. This focuses on the acts of individual choice, which are the heart of learning; but emphasizing the help that as educators we provide to the student in decision making aimed at the desired change. To achieve effective learning, we will need to develop in our students some of the capacities involved in open learning: the ability to diagnose their own needs, to plan plans to achieve their own objectives, to evaluate the effectiveness of learning activities.In a word, it requires introducing into university teaching another style characterized by empowering students to learn to learn, applying learning to the real world, and here, due to its adaptability and modularity, it fits perfectly hypermedia.
In this context, university teaching materials should be designed for a dual use: both face-to-face students and those who cannot be physically present.
Educational Software
As hardware evolves, so does the conception of both basic and applied software.
Literature defines the generic concept of Educational Software as any computer program whose structural and functional characteristics support the process of teaching, learning and managing. A more restricted concept of Educational Software defines it as that learning material specially designed to be used with a computer in the teaching and learning processes.
It can be pointed out that, unlike printed books, in which the reading is done sequentially from the beginning to the end, in a hypermedial environment the "reading" can be done in a non-linear way, and the users are not obliged to follow an established sequence, but they can move through the information and intuitively leaf through the contents by association, following their interests in search of a term or concept. In the figure, the sequential style and the hypertext style are represented.
It can be said, then, that educational software could be defined as that software intended to support the instruction or learning of certain content by the user, within a computer-based learning environment.
Essential features of educational software:
- They are materials elaborated with a didactic purpose, as is clear from the definition. They use the computer as a support in which the students carry out the activities that they propose. They are interactive, they immediately answer the students' actions and allow a dialogue and an exchange of Information between the computer and the students. They individualize the work of the students, since they adapt to the rhythm of each work and can adapt their activities according to the performances of the students. They are easy to use. The computer skills required to use most of these programs are similar to the electronics skills required to use a video, that is, they are minimal, although each program has operating rules that must be known.
Websites and university libraries
The website of a library changes the idea of access to the physical document (Traditional Library) for the idea of access to content, that is, a replacement of the shelf where the book is stored by links to documents in digital format, the Internet being the greatest and most universal facilitator of libraries.
Specialized libraries are challenged to develop potential for research support by providing value-added documentary services tailored to the needs of their users.
The website of a university library is considered as the virtual, flexible space, where technological infrastructures, human resources, spaces, equipment and services (provided at any time and accessible from anywhere) converge and integrate, aimed at student learning and investigation. It will allow identifying, selecting, evaluating and organizing the pertinent information resources, guiding the student in his instruction, the teacher in his teaching work and the researcher in his research work.
A Website is a set of electronic files and Web pages that are accessible using the Internet's HTTP protocol. This set of pages aims to develop a theme, provide services or deliver content associated with the page environment. A website must be generally encoded in HTML, being navigable through a web page browser. You can also create dynamic pages using Webservers that have some programming language support. (For example: PHP, ASP, JSP, etc.).
For this reason, this generally allows:
- The information required by the user, regardless of its type and / or location. Greater use of human and material resources. Offer information in a shorter time. Expand opportunities for access to information. Develop new possibilities for storage, processing and information retrieval.
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