Learning Objects: creating and sharing media for education

Today's students are, from a very small age, avid technology users. This profile of student demands that the school fits their reality, using media in their teaching-learning process. Therefore, Learning Objects (LOS) emerge as an alternative to introduce media in the classroom. There are already several initiatives on the internet that share LOS previously produced. Among these initiatives the various types of repositories that aim to index, classify and share LOS stand out. However, because they are relatively new initiatives, their repositories present some difficulties for its users, especially in regards to the variety of content, accessibility and usability. There are also notable initiatives with the objective of creating and disseminating LOS through the internet, outside formal repositories. Thus, this article aims, through bibliographic review, to list the concepts of LOS and to study their types and characteristics. It also seeks to examine the characteristics of specialized repositories, as well as to map independent and not indexed initiatives that produce LOS.