Abstract:

The paper describes the research aimed at identifying the attitudes of students of the first year of engineering study to the model of teaching computer science subjects with an emphasis on the development of creativity, independence, social skills of students as well as critical thinking. The described results are a part of a broader research, whose main objective was to determine the impact of the proposed teaching model on the students' Software Engineering (SWE) and Business Process Modelling (MPP) subjects.

Emphasis is placed not only on the creativity, autonomy and social skills of students in the development of the project but also on critical thinking and verbal skills developed through student evaluation of other students' projects. Moreover, the evaluation of projects by both teachers and students is more objective.

The research had two primary objectives. The first was to find out whether there is a statistically significant difference in attitudes of students towards SWE and MPP, whether the application of different forms of project assignment (group / individual assignment) influenced students' attitude to subjects. The second objective was to find out whether there was a statistically significant difference in the attitudes of men and women to the form of project assignment and evaluation.

To answer the research questions, we used a questionnaire constructed based on the semantic differential. It was created in MOODLE using Feedback tool. The attitude to the assessed subjects was measured using several 5-degree Likert scales in terms of selected factors. An anonymous questionnaire was filled in by 52 respondents online (48% of SWE and MPP students). T-tests were used for statistical verification of established hypotheses.

The obtained results indicate that students consider the subject of MPP, where they worked out an individual project as less demanding compared to the subject SWE, in which they worked on a group project. The results confirmed a statistically significant difference in the perception of the difficulty of SWE and MPP. The results obtained also indicate that women prefer the group assignment of the project. The results also showed that students consider the feedback from the teacher to be more useful than the feedback from classmates. There was also a statistically significant difference in the perception of the usefulness of feedback from classmates and teachers.

The obtained results were analysed and the results of the analysis are used to modify the proposed model of teaching computer science subjects with an emphasis on the development of creativity, independence, social skills of students as well as critical thinking.

Keywords:

Teaching model, project, student´s attitude, evaluation.