Una Metodología para el Análisis de la Interacción Comunicativa en los Foros del Metacampus del Sistema de Universidad Virtual, Universidad de Guadalajara

The use of New Communication Technologies (ICTs) in education has been described in the literature as having significantly benefited the current educational system in general. Based on this, it is essential for academics and teachers to maintain their training and awareness in these new learning scenarios, that is, by using and implementing ICTs in their professional practice. The role of teachers has transformed considerably, and they must focus on training in virtualization, instructional design, the development of educational programs using ICTs, and communicative interaction strategies in virtual media. Similarly, students are gradually abandoning their role of passively listening to what the teacher tells them and now have an active role, responsible for their learning, autonomous and participatory, where communicative interaction practices among participants are decisive in the development of activities and the achievement of objectives, specifically on a virtual platform. This article addresses the problem of communicative interaction on a virtual platform, and specifically in a communication space such as the forum, within the platform of the Virtual University System (VUS) of the University of Guadalajara, Mexico (UDG), called Metacampus, using a subject from the Bachelor of Education (LED). In the methodological work, a mixed paradigm was implemented to understand how activities are developed, focusing on communication. Specifically, this paradigm was used to identify core elements in a virtual learning environment related to the participants' participation. This allowed us to identify the type of communicative interaction and the types of messages sent to the Metacampus forum The results of the analysis of the data collected from Project I, a course in Educational Development, from the Virtual University System at the University of Guadalajara are presented. Significant participation was observed, with 590 messages, of which 475 were from students and 115 from advisors. A tendency toward descriptive messages was identified, with a total of 253, corresponding to 42.88%. It was observed that communicative interaction took place in the forums significantly, but especially in messages from students of a social, emotional, greeting, and recognition nature. Similarly, it was concluded that the messages were purely personal, with no communicative interaction regarding content, disputing a message, or disapproving of the content.