Abstract:

We have carried out a multidisciplinary teaching experience, at Rey Juan Carlos University, in which a group of students from the Software Engineering Degree, following the Project Based Learning (PBL) approach, have collaborated in a working team with "student instructors" from the Business Management and Administration Degree, to develop an educational tool with built-in gamification that could be used to learn about the subject of Financial Accounting, which includes accounting fundamentals. Specifically, the tool has been developed by students of the Web Application Development course. This application uses gamification to aid in the learning of Financial Accounting, with the aim of improving their skills in the preparation of accounting notes and increasing the motivation of students, encouraging the spirit of improvement through rewards, thus internalizing the knowledge in a more playful way.

The experience consisted on different phases: first of all, we chose a group of "student instructors" who already passed the Financial Accounting course, belonging to the Business Management and Administration Grade, with the aim of teaching basic accounting knowledge to a group of students in the course of Web Application Development, belonging to the Software Engineering Grade. The learning of this last group of students has been based on PBL, where the project was the creation of an educational tool for learning Financial Accounting through gamification. The next phase, planned for the next academic year, will be the application of the developed tool, "CONTaFin, Have Fun Learning Accounting", in the Financial Accounting course, where students can put into practice different exercises, through the achievement of different levels of exercises and badges, thus being able to learn in a simple and playful way, even outside the classroom.

Our training project encompasses three objectives to achieve a common learning objective. First, the application of the PBL methodology for students in the third year of the Software Engineering Degree who have created the tool to learn accounting through gamification, which has meant learning under the objective of creating a real and useful application; second, for Business Management and Administration students, who have been working as "student instructors", that have been able to consolidate their knowledge of a subject that serves as a basic accounting foundation for advanced courses; and third, for first-year Business Management and Administration students who, thanks to the "CONTaFin, Have fun learning accounting" application, will have their basic financial accounting course complemented by a gamification tool, which will improve their knowledge and skills in accounting and, above all, increase the motivation that this entails.

In order to analyse the motivation results of this strategy of teaching innovation, we have carried out a satisfaction survey that has exceeded our expectations, since the students valued the usefulness of the project as well as their willingness to be motivated when it comes to developing it, which in turn reinforces the desire of the team of teachers who are experts in the different disciplines to continue advancing it in future years.

Keywords:

Project Based Learning, Gamification, Multidisciplinarity.