(1490)INTEGRATING THE CLASSROOM AND THE LABORATORY IN THETEACHING OF COMPUTER NETWORKS

摘要

The educational program of Electronics and Communications Engineering (IEC by its name inSpanish) of the Universidad Veracruzana (UV) in Mexico, includes the area of computing, withsubjects such as Data Transmission (DT) and Computer Networks (CN). These courses are usuallyoffered to students currently enrolled in their third year of undergraduate studies, and have a highcontent of concepts whose application in professional practice are of great value. Teaching experiencein these courses has highlighted the advantages of being able to integrate the theoretical work withthe practical work in the same space, in other words, the integration of the classroom and thelaboratory.Formally, the addressed topics in each course are set out in the Curriculum for each subject. Theevaluation criteria allow the grading of the acquired knowledge and skills developed by studentsthroughout the scholar period through the submission of exams, the development of practices, theelaboration of documentary research reports from reputable sources and the implementation ofprojects.It is in the implementation of projects, the part of the courses in which, working together, students arefaced with situations similar to those of professional work, having the need to interact with theircolleagues in specific cases resolution, which lead to implement computer networks. From groupanalysis of the case to solve, usually arise two or more proposals of solution, they analyze theadvantages and disadvantages of each, and reach a joint solution proposal. Students then proceed tothe construction and testing of cables, device interconnection is performed and configuration ofcomputers and network equipment is done. Subsequently, the network is tested in operation.Sometimes it is necessary to make some minor corrections. The project culminates with theelaboration and delivery of a report of the work done.This paper presents the results of the work described above, applied to groups of subjects DT andCN, located in semesters 5 and 6 of the IEC program in different scholar periods..