Abstract:

The subject "Experimentation in Chemical Engineering III" of the Degree of Chemical Engineering from the “Universitat Politècnica de Valencia” (UPV) is the last of a block of core laboratory subjects which has to develop the specific competence “Design of processes in different industrial activities in the field of chemical engineering”. On the other hand, the subject has assigned the transversal competence "Design and project", whose development through the curriculum is aimed to develop in the student the ability todesign, direct and evaluate an idea to effectively transform it in a project.

In order to develop these competences, specific and transversal, in the above-mentioned subject, the Project Oriented Learning (POL) was selected as the most appropriate methodology since it is a method of teaching and learning in which students carry out a project at a certain time to solve a problem or deal with a task through the planning, design and implementation of a series of activities. In addition, previous experiences of the application of this methodology in similar experimental subjects have shown that it improves learning and motivation of students, among other reasons, by the approach to professional environment.

For the implementation of this methodology in the mentioned subject, we requested a project for innovation and educational improvement in the announcement of the 2015-16 course of the UPV, which was implemented during the 2nd semester of the last year 2016-17 with very satisfactory results. This paper describes how the integration of Project Oriented Learning was defined and carried out in the subject, it shows the main results achieved and analyses the level of satisfaction of students with the new methodology developed.

Keywords:

Project Oriented Learning, experimentation, chemical engineering, design, project.