Abstract:

Current teaching methods in STEM disciplines encompass a wide range of opportunities for non-lecture-based learning strategies. These reach beyond the transmission of concepts and procedures, towards enabling students to become active learners and apply scientific argumentation. This project focuses on the design and development of teaching strategies and aims to improve learning results for a diverse group of on-campus international undergraduate engineering students. It gathers some findings and reflections of an internationalization project on the use of TICs. This project is set in the context of leveraging students' digital skills, boosting their active participation in the classroom and assessing their learning. In this regard, we evaluate some features of the use of both the peer assessment and the student response systems (SRS) in the classroom.

With regard to the use of digital resources to improve the active learning, one task stems from the shift towards the E-textbook-based education, oriented to the problem-solving method. This activity can sometimes be preceded by autonomous learning, so that learners must study the principles and basics of a topic during the previous weekend. Students are prompted in the classroom to solve a problem on their own. No two data sets are alike, given that those are functions of their registration numbers. They can access the E-textbooks and other digital resources. After a prescribed time, their works are collected and delivered back randomly. The instructor exposes in detail the solving procedure as well as the symbolic results. In this way, students can learn about how to address the problem, identify solving alternatives or possible difficulties and raise queries. They can particularize the results shown by the lecturer and assess their classmates' exercises. To guarantee objectivity, no personal identification is written on the exercises but the registration number.

Another line of work deals with the application of classroom response systems for continuous assessment with regard to solving problems. Students are required to access the problem statement through their mobile devices, solve it and respond to some inquiries. The Socrative framework has proven to be an effective tool in this issue. After the task, the instructor solves the problem and respond to queries or difficulties encountered by the students.

We conducted surveys on the use of both traditional and these innovative teaching methods. The survey items dealt with the extent of satisfaction with the learning experience, the degree of usefulness for acquiring competences, the individual willingness to participate, among others. We have collected some interesting feedback on the benefits, readiness indicators and students' perceptions. Thus, the method has improved the quality of significant learning, the class time and the figures of outcomes. We report student perspectives on problem-based learning as a substitute to the classical passive face-to-face lecturing.

Lastly, we include some reflections on the combined use of peer assessment and classroom response systems in the Civil Engineering curriculum within a shift from a passive, face-to-face to a digital resource-based pedagogy.

Keywords:

Student response systems, peer assessment, blended learning, learning assessment, teaching innovations.