Abstract:

Student demographic diversification, because of the introduction of inclusive educational policies in recent decades, has led to a sector of students studying degrees they do not want. This is related to some sources such as vocational choice opportunities, social recognition, labor market, etc., causing a decrease in academic standards.

The main teaching-learning theories developed in recent years point out that knowledge is neither imposed nor transmitted through direct teaching but is generated through the learning activities of students. Thus, learning depends only on what students do and think, and teachers can only promote learning by influencing the activities students do to learn. The application of the theory of motivational systems to the academic environment, states that learning is the result of a motivated individual, who possesses the necessary skills and prior knowledge, who is in the appropriate biological conditions, and is in an environment that facilitates the performance of learning tasks and activities. On the other hand, it states that the motivation to perform a task is a complex response to the challenge created by the achievement of a personal goal. This goal may be oriented to accomplish an objective or avoid a failure (performance goals), or to respond to the need to learn (mastery goals).

The ACESIQ project objective is to promote the effective academic performance of students in the Chemical Engineering degree program through the constructive alignment of methods and assessment with learning objectives to activate performance goals. Furthermore, this project aims to generate an environment sensitive to learning in the classroom using active methodologies and teacher awareness of the diversity of goals of the current student population to awaken mastery goals. To this end, it is intended to conduct a review of the teaching guides of the subjects involved that reveal inconsistencies and/or deficiencies in the definition of learning objectives and methods and assessment. As a result of this review, tasks will be designed, based on different active methodologies, that are better aligned with the learning objectives, and elaborate appropriate challenges for the students. Other actions include: the development of a rubric to define the degree of understanding of each learning objective and an anonymous survey to quantify the distribution of student goals (to be carried out at the beginning and end of each subject involved) and an activity to recognize students whose goals are of mastery, in order to generate heterogeneous groups in class. In this study, the objectives, methodology and preliminary results of the project are presented.

Acknowledgements:
The authors acknowledge the Vice-Principal for Employment and Training Services for the project ACESIQ (UV-SFPIE_PID-2079662).

Keywords:

Constructive alignment, active methodologies, performance goals.