Abstract

As learning management systems (LMSs) continue to develop and increase teaching functionalities within the learning environment with tools that are increasingly becoming more conducive to collaborative learning, developing their pedagogical use continues to be extremely limited after decades. Different studies have shown that perfecting and training on information and communication technology (ICT) use has not been enough to produce significant changes in teaching practice. Teachers’ competence in knowing why, when, and how to best implement technology and its frequency, together with pedagogical competence, plays a decisive role in adapting tools for the development of new teaching strategies. This study aims to identify the main reasons why teachers do not use Moodle, or rarely use it, in their teaching. With this purpose, a survey was conducted within a population of 640 teachers from a higher technical-professional educational institution in Chile. Among the reasons identified for why Moodle is not used or rarely used for pedagogical means, the common opinion is that the main use for the platform is management work. Considering that today, most higher education institutions have adopted LMSs as a management system and that teachers are obligated to use it for these tasks, lead us to affirm that the frequency of usage is one of the factors that most determines the tools’ usefulness and therefore influences the degree of their adoption. Another relevant reason for not using the platform is the feeling of having to invest a lot of time. Also, in this case, the frequency of usage along with pedagogical skills could favorably influence the time investment necessary to manage the platform. It is clear, therefore, that the degree to which ICTs are used in the classroom, along with the tool’s management, respond to multiple factors among which we highlight pedagogical skills and frequency of usage.