The structure of electronic course of technical discipline: problems and format solutions

Today the experience of educational institutions in use of distance educational and e-learning technologies is rich enough. The majority of the available e-learning courses have a humanitarian focus. This is due to the fact that the development of an electronic educational complex in technical discipline is frequently linked with problems of choosing a format of knowledge transfer and presentation of content. We consider that it is very important to determine the structure of the course within competence-based approach in the course of designing technical disciplines. It is talked of enhancing interactivity between theory and practice, the growth of student’s qualification to acquire the necessary skills subsequently in practice. The authors propose to examine the development of e-learning environment at NSUACE (Sibstrin) and with the problems and options for their solutions in terms of teaching, first of all, in technical and fundamental disciplines. Based on experience obtained, humanitarian online courses are significantly easier to publish in system of distance learning. And this despite the fact that the structure of educational complex which acts as a basis in the process of e-learning course designing is united for all disciplines and majors at our university. The main difficulty, as noted above, is in the format choice that optimizes the transfer of theory to students and influences beneficially on student’s willingness to form skills and abilities in the discipline under study. There are a number of difficulties when developing e-learning courses for technical and fundamental disciplines. In particular, problems arise in remote performing laboratory and practical works, in the development of requirements to the individual student practical electronic course modules, to the description of the course. Virtualization of laboratory work, in our opinion, significantly reduces the gap between theory and practice, thereby realizing the purpose of education in the framework of the competence-based approach that is to focus on the practical component of the curriculum. The educational process has productive nature, and the dominant component of the process is practice and independent work of the student. The experience of using e-courses and technical disciplines in the educational process of NSUACE (Sibstrin) shows that the sensitivity of the student to theory increases significantly with the increased support of the base elements for the formation of practical skills, such as virtual labs. E-learning cannot completely replace classroom training, but it can prepare students to that. It is very difficult to develop a computer simulation of experimental setups for all laboratory workshops, and for some of them it is impossible. But it is necessary to find a rational ratio between classroom hours and hours for independent work in the distance learning system of the university.

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