Abstract:

Project Oriented Learning (POL) is an active methodology very suitable for senior students. It facilitates the approach of the students to their professional environment. and it also promotes implication of students in their learning process. POL has been applied with success for nearly 10 years in the course “Advanced Experimentation” of the 4th year of Chemical Engineering (Universitat Politècnica València). The task of students consisted of doing a project of an industrial plant design in groups of four people. The design was based on the data obtained in several experimental sessions at the laboratory. The application of this methodology has produced excellent results, from the point of view of academic grades [1] and satisfaction level of students [2].

Experience has shown that the successful implementation of this methodology relies on monitoring the progress of the Project in tutorial sessions between students andlecturers, and also on the time spent by the students in the development of the work. Therefore, in the last years we have developed tools for recording the time spent by lecturers and students in doing the Project, apart from laboratory sessions. All of this in order to assess the working hours dedicated to the project, and thus be able to evaluate the workload that POL application requires for new experimental courses associated to the implementation of Bolonia plan in the Grade of Chemical Engineering.
In this work, we describe the methodology followed to record the time invested in the development of the project, and we show the results obtained in the last two years (2011/12 and 2012/13).

References:
[1] J.M. Arnal, B. García-Fayos, M. Sancho, A. Santafé, B. Cuartas. “Análisis de los resultados académicos tras la implantación del Aprendizaje Basado en Proyectos en una asignatura experimental”. Jornadas de Innovación Educativa ICE, 2011 (Universitat Politècnica de València)
[2] J.M. Arnal, M. Sancho, B. García-Fayos. “Evaluation by the students of the implementation of Project Oriented Learning in an experimental subject of chemical engineering”. INTED 2012, Valencia (Spain)

Keywords:

Chemical Engineering, Project Oriented Learning, experimentation, workload.