Abstract:

We can define project-based learning as “a systematic teaching method that engages students in learning knowledge and skills through an extended inquiry process structured around complex, authentic questions and carefully designed products and tasks.”. In general, students work in small groups and act as self-managers. They are responsible for planning, resources allocation, research, implementation, and finalization. The teacher acts as mediator and motivator. He supports students with necessary guidelines and feedback but is not involved directly in the tasks implementation. Scrum is an iterative and incremental agile framework for managing software product development. In 2011, two Dutch chemistry teachers deployed Scrum in the teaching process and introduced a new paradigm called eduScrum. They gave students an opportunity to work collaborative, more effective and to develop their soft skills.

The study program Business Informatics produces graduates with a combination of informatics and economic knowledge and skills in all three levels (bachelor, master, PhD.). This combination is currently intensive required from the members of the ICT cluster called IT Valley located in Eastern Slovakia region (e.g. IBM, FPT, T-Systems or NESS).

We implemented Scrum for the first time in one of our courses called Analysis and design of Information systems. This course offers basic theoretical and practical knowledge needed for the whole life cycle of the software development process. We focus mainly on the analysis and design, i.e. from problem definition, through state of the art, user requirements identification and collection to technical specification containing user scenarios, UML diagrams, architecture, and mock-ups. Our motivation was to improve an effectiveness of the students work on several levels: tasks decomposition, deadlines with partial results and a regular work during the whole semester, collaboration, communication, and self-presentation. We combined SCRUM with selected techniques of active learning as retrieval practice or case-based learning. After two first instances, student’s feedback was mostly positive. They were satisfied with a regularly work during the whole semester; the collaborative approach stimulated their motivation. Some students proposed to replace the traditional paper form of the Scrum Task Board with electronic.

In the next step, we face a challenge covering a combination of two methodologies/frameworks: Scrum and CRISP-DM. We expect a better teamwork, right results delivered in time, a stronger team communication and an effective management of the paths to the goals. Also, we would like to use more intensively our analytical package designed and developed within FP6 IST project KP-Lab. It contains a set of services for collection, storing, analysis and visualization of the data representing user’s behaviour in a virtual environment. We will be able to identify different learning paths for customization, improvements, and evaluation.

Keywords:

Scrum, project-based learning, university.