Abstract:

The first semester in the University is very critical for the students in the learning process along all the university degrees. It is very important that students get the necessary habits to achieve the needed skills than the society demands one time they graduate. Additionally, it is known that there is a clear relation between the success of the students and their study habits.

Unfortunately, very often the study habits developed before entering the University are not enough consolidated to handle in this first year at the University in a good suitable way. The detection of difficulties associated with inappropriate study habits can already be detected during the first semester at the University. It is important to point out that the improvement of the study habits at an early stage in the learning process can contribute positively to a good academic progression of the students.

With the aim to get information about the student profile and the study habits, we present in this communication the results from the pools carried out at the beginning and at the end of the semester. We have focused our attention on the Fundamental Chemistry (FC) course, a mandatory first semester subject belonging to the Chemical and Materials Engineering degrees at the University of Barcelona. For this study, all the analyzed data correspond to the students that enrolled this course in the academic year 2014-2015.

The information related to the student profile has been obtained on the basis of parameters such as motivation, preference given to the Chemical and Materials Engineering degrees in the selection process, priority given to the university studies among other activities and compatibility with external jobs, among others.

Concerning to the study habits, the parameters that have been considered and analyzed have been the level of difficulty of the FC course compared to previous chemistry courses, the participation in the classroom discussions, the dedication to the University studies and the distribution of the study time along the semester, among others. These data have been correlated with the grades obtained for these students in the University Access Test and in the FC final exam.