Abstract:

In order to give an incentive to innovation and improvement of teaching practice, the University Carlos III of Madrid, since 2002, has activated the “Innovation Teaching Program's support”. This program has been shown as an excellent experimental frame in which teams of lecturers have innovated on several issues: methodology, assessment systems, new skills , e-learning, etc. It has been a big challenge for some lecturers with responsibility in basic-core subjects such as Mathematics, because they have had to jump the inertia associated to classical methodologies.
We present the results achieved through three consecutive Innovation Teaching Projects that have been applied to a second course of Calculus in undergraduates studies on Computer Science Engineering. The starting point was the analysis of students academic results on previous years, showing: unmotivated students, absenteeism, low level academic grade, etc. These projects have deeply modified important parts of mathematical teaching, such as: methodology, assessment system and coordination between lecturers of Calculus courses. The methodology has been mainly changed using new technologies: videoprojectors, computer laboratories, digital presentations, professional mathematical software (Matlab), etc. The assessment system has evolved since only one final exam to a continuum assessment of students. The coordination has changed the classical role of "one lecturerone course" to a team of lecturers that are involved in a Calculus course split on several groups of students during academic years. Some new kind of skills were integrated, for example, ability to work in groups and improvement of oral and writing skills.
As a main conclusion, we will show that the three innovation teaching projects have improved the problematic issues mentioned when we have described the starting point. Also, some important parts of the projects have been directly incorporated during the design of Calculus subjects in the study program Bachelor in Informatics Engineering adapted to European Higher Education Area (EHEA).

Keywords:

innovation projects motivation, evaluation systems, european space for higher education.