Quo Vadis - International Conference
FIG Working Week 2000, 21-26 May, Prague

Proceedings



Internet in Education, Practical Experience and Future Plans

Aleš Čepek and Josef Hnojil

Key words: Internet, Internet in education, XML.


Abstract

Introduction

The most of teachers in all types of education levels face with innovations in teaching and learning which are often denoted as computer-assisted teaching (CAT) and computer-based learning (CAL).

Computer and information technologies surround us in our whole life. The same situation is in the branch of geodesy and cartography which is also fully computerized. We would like to show examples and evolution of computers and Internet usage in teaching and learning in this branch. First of the authors has been already teaching computer oriented subjects for seven years, so we can follow all the computer-based enhancements in education with him.

Evolution - how it was, how it is

The first regular seminar about Internet services started in the end of year 1993. There was not World Wide Web service - the Internet consisted of textual documents and few pictures. Both teachers and students were experiencing a new technology. At this place it must be said that from the first moment Internet was seen as another but powerful working tool. The power of the Internet is in communication, collaboration and cooperation. Emphasis in Internet and informatics lessons must be on process and strategy not on destinations and techniques.

As the consciousness of the Internet was coming wider we included the Internet lessons as part of informatics lessons in the first year of graduate studies. Computers are used in almost all lessons as a working tool. We established electronic mailing lists for some lessons (programming, informatics and databases) so the students have another forum for discussing professional topics and problems. The main problem is that students still miss the need for sharing their knowledge as it is common at other (mostly West European and American) universities. They do small steps and the frequency of messages in the electronic mailing lists is increasing every year.

As the World Wide Web service widespread we started to put some course materials (abstracts, literature, homeworks, etc.) on-line. The potential of the WWW is at 24-hour access to documents.

In some seminars students are encouraged to write a paper about selected topics. They must use information sources - instead of drilling down the facts they practice finding useful information in libraries, thematical databanks and on the Internet. For most of them it is the first attempt to write their own technical paper in which they can express their own ideas.

There were more changes last year. First, we started to put annotations of diplomas on-line to our web site. Second, we started to develop Open Source project called GaMa (Geodesy and Mapping). The main objective is the development of public on-line service for adjustment of geodetic 2D networks; our students are involved in the project.

Future plans and expectations

We would like to see more intensive usage of modern information technologies in our branch in the near future. For this purpose the branch information strategy needs to be developed because a non-coordinated application of computers and information technologies would depreciate high status of the branch. We are optimistic that it will be realized.


Aleš Čepek and Josef Hnojil
Department of Mapping and Cartography
Faculty of Civil Engineering
Czech Technical University in Prague
Thákurova 7
CZ-166 29
CZECH REPUBLIC
Tel. + 420 2 2435 4647
Tel. + 420 2- 435 4650
E-mail: cepek@fsv.cvut.cz
E-mail: hnojil@fsv.cvut.cz
Website: http://gama.fsv.cvut.cz


Internet in Education, Practical Experience and Future plans

We believe that educators in all educational levels face the innovations in teaching and learning which are often denoted as computer-assisted teaching (CAT) and computer-based learning (CAL). Computer and information technologies are getting more or less standard and integral part of our life. The same situation is in the branch of geodesy and cartography which is also becoming computerized. We would like to present our practical experience with our efforts of introducing the Internet as an educational tool in education of surveyors at TU Prague.

As Stig Enemark noted, "the environment in which the surveyors practice is changing rapidly, according to technological and managerial development" (Enemark, 1996). Although there is no formal coordination in developing educational methods, almost every team comes to the same conclusion; usage of electronic tools is necessary if the branch of surveyors and cartographers wants to survive and hold high level and keep in contact with other branches. The most important idea which must be considered when developing new methods for learning is the ease of usage.

We started our first seminar introducing Internet services to our students towards the end of 1993. It was the end of the pre-Web era; the information sources of the Internet consisted mainly of textual documents at that time. Both teachers and students were experiencing a new technology. We considered the Internet from the first moment to be a powerful working tool of future. And the more, it was one of the first glimpses of coming freedom, after four decades of communist totalitarian regime, bringing us the possibilities of communication, collaboration and cooperation which we had never met before. There is no doubt that emphasis in Internet and informatics lessons must be on process and strategy not on destinations and techniques.

One of our problems at that time was, that if we wanted to promote active usage of the Internet among our students (for example creating web pages), we had no other choice but to start running our own internet server. It cost us a lot of time and energy on the one hand, but we gained a lot of practical experience on the other hand, which we would never get otherwise. Linux was our choice of operating system and it has proven to be the good choice. It has given us the starting ground for our present activities like running our own Apache web server with dynamically generated web pages based on PHP or the background necessary for introduction of XML technology of structured data documents into our projects. Here we would like to mention our collaboration with the Czech research institute for geodesy (VUGTK) on the project of online public access to the library catalogue.

We appreciate on the Internet its immense possibilities of direct communication among people. In our seminars we run electronic mailing lists as the active forum of the communication as opposed to the more or less passive presentation of learning materials on the web. In these mailing lists we are trying to persuade our students to answer questions of their student-colleagues as much as possible (active role in the list is taken into account at the examination). The main problem is that our students still miss the need for sharing their knowledge as it is common at other (mostly West European and American) universities.

As we have mentioned before, our main platform is Linux - a new phenomenon which would never come to the existence without the Internet. Our practical experience with the Open Source Software as represented by FSF, GNU or Linux inspired us to the considerations whether we could add our own contribution to this movement. As the result, we started project of free geodetic GNU software: C++ template libraries GaMaLib (and gMatVec) for adjustment of geodetic 2D networks. Even in this very special subject the idea of open software proved to be attractive to our selected students.

Our future plans are concerning long-term project focused on usage of XML language in the field of geodesy and cartography. At the present we have managed to introduce the idea of XML as the platform independent tool for data description in the project of metainformation system of the Czech Association for Geoinformation (CAGI). The main reason of our short memo was to inform briefly about our activities and at the same time we would like to use the possibility of meeting our colleagues during FIG 2000 Working Week to find partners for future collaboration.

References

Enemark, S., 1996, The Work of FIG Commission 2, In: Proceedings of FIG Commission 2 Joint Workshop on Computer Assisted Learning and Achieving Quality in the Education of Surveyors, Sept. 4-6

Čepek, A. - Hnojil, J.: First Contacts with Internet at the Czech Technical University. In Trevor Owen, Ron Owston, Cheryl Dickie (Eds.): The Learning Highway: A Student's Guide to Using the Internet in High School and College, Key Porter Books, Toronto, 1995, ISBN 1-550130615-1, pp.186-189

Čepek, A. - Zimová, R., Cartography, GIS and the Internet in Education. In: Proceedings II. - GIS Frontiers in Business and Science, konference GIS'96, 20.-24.4.1996


Aleš Čepek and Josef Hnojil
Czech Technical University in Prague
Department of Mapping and Cartography, Faculty of Civil Engineering
E-mail:cepek@fsv.cvut.cz and hnojil@fsv.cvut.cz
Web site: http://gama.fsv.cvut.cz/

27 March 2000



This page is maintained by the FIG Office. Last revised on 15-09-04.