GEOGRAPHY AND MOOC. ANALYSING THE STATE OF THE ART

Abstract

Different tools are applied to transmit Geography by universities, schools, and professionals... Nowadays, the university teaching is in a process of reflexion and evaluation about concrete pedagogical guidelines, which help to innovate and understand the actual exigencies of the information society. The use of TICs and the new methods in E-Learning are essentials, and for the Geography cannot be indifferent. This discipline was reconverted with the application of Moodle platforms or Webs 2.0. during the last decade, for example, to teach Geographical Information Systems (GIS) or dense topics like Political Geography. 

Despite the relative novelty of MOOC (Massively Open Online Courses) in the virtual academic world, today this tool represents a great achievement for the virtual and real time learning. COURSERA, EDX, FUTURE LEARN, IVERSITY, LYNDA, MOOC-Advisor Beta, OPEN2Study, SAYLOR.ORG and UDACITY are examples of international platforms, which work to design and prepare only specific courses. On the other hand, some Spanish MOOC platforms are AbiertaUGR, MiriadaX, REDUNX, UNED COMA and Unimooc. Furthermore, there are available courses about Geography (associated direct or indirectly). The creation of different topics with audio-visual materials and interesting elaborated texts, along three or four weeks (depend of course), free access and without economic costs are some characteristics of the MOOC.