Abstract:

The implementation of the European Higher Education Area (EHEA) in the Spanish system implied important changes at structural and organizational levels, focusing on the student as the key player of the learning process. In this context, formative evaluation plays an important role and the development of objective tools to help asses and improve innovative educational practices is one of the main difficulties encountered. At this respect in particular, the use of rubrics is an excellent option and its usage has been considerably increased in classrooms at Universities.
This communication presents an experience developed by the Biology, Biochemistry and Biotechnology Innovation Group (Grupo de Innovación Docente en Biología, Bioquímica y Biotecnología, GID-BBT) in the Faculty of Science of the University of Burgos. This experience is included (contextualized) within a broader research on development and implementation of rubrics for training activities in subjects taught by academic of the Biochemistry and Molecular Biology Area, such us laboratory practices and work groups activities. The present study involved the elaboration of rubrics to evaluate the laboratory practices of the subjects of “General Biology” and “Biochemistry” imparted in the first course of the Food Science and Technology degree throughout the academic year 2013-14. At the end of the activities we have collected the impressions of the students by means of satisfaction surveys. The analysis of the resulting data suggested that the students of “General Biology” and “Biochemistry” valued the rubrics as a useful tool (85 and 92%) that facilitates (82 and 82%) a successful accomplishment of the activity. The overall satisfaction, for the mentioned subjects, with the proposed learning activity was 95 and 92%, and 81 and 83% with the evaluation criteria, respectively.

Keywords:

Biology and Biochemistry, Laboratory training activities, rubrics.