Abstract:

This project presents an educational co-design proposal to improve Physiology learning of students with multidisciplinary backgrounds in the Master’s Degree in Biomedical Engineering by stimulating their involvement, commitment and responsibility. The students worked in pairs for preparing a monography that brought together the subjects of Physiology and Biomedical Engineering. After selecting a topic of their interest, that could be applicable to their professional or research opportunities, they worked for twelve weeks on preparing a presentation for their classmates.

During this time, all students participated through a discussion forum on a Virtual Campus based on Moodle platform and collaboratively integrated the knowledge related to their areas. Each group received immediate feedback from their classmates, which enriched the knowledge acquired and improved the preparation of the monography.

In the final sessions, each group presented a summary of the most recent developments in their respective areas of Biomedical Engineering. An exchange and dialogue between all the class-group followed, generating and sharing knowledge on the topics presented. A three-step model was used to evaluate the student’s learning process: a co-evaluation by peers, a self-evaluation and an evaluation by the teaching staff. A guided pre-established criterion was used in each case to ensure a fair and impartial evaluation. The final summary of each monography, with clear conclusions, remains in repository form uploaded to the Virtual Campus.

The students' perception on the performance of the different learning activities was mostly positive, with more than 50% grades between 4 and 5 out of 5. Regarding the students’ participation in the evaluation of their classmates, approximately 80% considered the forums used in the Virtual Campus useful for acquiring the new concepts presented by their peers. Peer feedback was also highlighted as crucial for the completion of the students’ work, reinforcing the importance of considering groups with multidisciplinary background in Master’s Degree Education. In addition, more than 70% considered that group assessment facilitated discussion and provided a broad and critical view of their work.

Over 80% of students participated in the forums, considering that the peer assessment was carried out with objective criteria. Overall, the participants considered that the instructions provided by the teaching staff were adequate to carry out the activities in an objective manner. All students preferred that the final mark did not depend solely on an exam, considered that the number of tasks demanded in the course were not excessive and that working in group reinforced the learning of Physiology, even though more than half declared that the confection of the monography had not a great influence for preparing the final exam.

In relation to the Virtual Campus, students considered it as a positive platform for learning the subject. In addition, it facilitated the processes of interaction and participation between groups and was suitable as a means of handing in assignments. In general, this tool was perceived as a powerful facilitator in the students' learning process, allowing them to carry out their activities more effectively and efficiently. In conclusion, this project shows a clear example of the importance of rapid feedback to the student and the importance of multidisciplinary work to improve motivation in student learning.

Keywords:

Self-training, self-evaluation, motivation, multidisciplinary.