Abstract:

Working in collaborative groups is frequently an important strategy used in many pedagogical innovations in university education. It is recognized its relevance in the development of skills and attitudes that promote better learning and contribute to achieve adequate levels of intrinsic motivation to learn, indispensable element in the formation of lifelong and autonomous apprentices. Particularly, in Problem-Based Learning (PBL) methodology, teamwork is a key element during the development of the learning process. However, collaboration is a complex activity that requires both personal and group commitment, cognitive strategies and skills for interaction with others; so that teamwork skills must be part of the learning objectives and their development must be mediated on a permanent basis. Attitudes, behaviours and cognitions are important components for the achievement of an effective team performance, so it is necessary to develop systems for evaluation and monitoring of these components during the teamwork process. In this way a feedback program can be established to provide the team with information on their progress and areas for improvement. There are a variety of proposals for monitoring the collaborative work of student groups, but few actually provide information on the actual situation of the dynamics developed in each case. In this work, an instrument was developed and applied over several semesters to work groups formed in the context of a general chemistry course of the first year of engineering of a Peruvian university, where a hybrid PBL modality was implemented. The instrument was intended to assess the perception of the members of the work teams about the positive and negative attitudes both at the individual and grouping levels. This research results showed the effect of these attitudinal aspects on the group's performance in terms of performance throughout the course and their academic achievements. The results obtained provide tangible evidence of the positive influence of the collaborative work component on achievements in an PBL process.

Keywords:

Teamwork, collaborative work, PBL, assessment.