A TOOL FOR MONITORING STUDENTS LEARNING PROGRESS
1 Polytechnic Institute of Castelo Branco (PORTUGAL)
2 R & D Unit in Digital Services, Applications and Content - Polytechnic Institute of Castelo Branco (PORTUGAL)
About this paper:
Conference name: 15th International Technology, Education and Development Conference
Dates: 8-9 March, 2021
Location: Online Conference
Abstract:
In higher education, as in other levels of education, there are different teaching strategies (expository with interaction, use of technological resources, problem-solving, project-based, game-based, etc.) in which success always depends on the involvement of students, the commitment of teachers, and much of the interaction between them in the task of contributing together so that the teaching-learning process is as fruitful as possible for the student. This task is not always easy for the teacher, because they have to divide the teaching activity with other tasks, because the number of students in charge is large, because each student has different characteristics and competences, etc. Correctly monitoring the different learning speeds of each student requires frequent collection of appropriate information, metrics and respective analysis. In this context, continuous assessment is a good approach, but it requires tools that, without consuming too much useful class time, allow the teacher to collect information about the perception and retention of knowledge by the students, and through the analysis of this information, allows them to adapt the strategies in order to reinforce the matters in which there are more difficulties or to increase the teaching pace in the case of matters already assimilated. It is also important that the collection of this information during class is done in a non-intrusive and in a motivating way, exploring the means currently available to students, namely in terms of technology.
With the tool presented in this paper, the teacher has at their disposal the means to check if at a given moment their students are assimilating the material taught, what percentage of them are having learning difficulties, if in a period of time they have evolved in terms of knowledge acquired, if students still remember what they have learned since a past period, etc. In this way, the syllabus planning and execution of a given subject can be improved in terms of focus and time slots for explanation of certain topics, reinforcement of exercises, evaluation emphasis, etc. With this tool, it is possible to simplify the sampling of the learning progress, and thus adopt strategies that bring gains in agility to the teaching-learning process.
Throughout the paper it is described the problem, the tool developed, the results achieved so far, as well as the lessons learned in the meantime and suggest some future work.Keywords:
Technology in education, web application, education, monitoring, learning progress.