ISLE: An Integrated Self-Learning system of Electronics Using a Virtual Laboratory as a Self-Assessment Tool

Students currently learn theoretical concepts about Electronics in class sessions and then go on to work in a laboratory. Usually, when they arrive to the laboratory they have insufficient knowledge about the relation between theory and practice and also measurement instruments operation. As a result, component damage is common during laboratory sessions. This paper introduces ISLE (Integrated Self-Learning System of Electronics), an integrated learning system for students to use as a self-assessment tool. The objective is to improve the students' knowledge about the relations between theory and practice and to prepare them to work efficiently in the laboratory. ISLE combines a hypermedia book with a virtual laboratory and a multimedia test tool. It follows the constructivist theory and constitutes an interactive computer-based complex tool enhancing competence based learning. The system was tested in a first course on Electronics. Four groups of students took part: two groups used ISLE and the other two groups did not. Having observed some differences in the means of both groups, a statistical comparison was conducted using SPSS. To compare the averages, a variance analysis (ANOVA for one factor) was carried out using Tukey contrast. The observed differences are significant.