Abstract:

During the COVID-19 pandemic in the last three years, education faced many changes. Most of the time students learned online during the pandemic situation and university lecturers faced new challenges when preparing themselves for the classes. Some of them are related to new software that needs to be used, others are related to students and their motivation for learning and staying focused on the issues studied during the practical exercises. Some of the challenges could be overcome with the education of the professors and assistant professors, and others could be solved with practice, but those concerning students are more difficult. They require more skills and willingness. The motivation of the lecturer is also an important part of solving the issues. Teachers could be educated about specific software programs. When they use them, in time, it becomes easy to solve some issues related to the products. If it is specialized software, that education could be provided also to students. The solution to motivating students and focusing on tasks is by using active learning methods. This paper presents the tasks that students need to perform when learning in a pandemic situation about coverage and interference in the discipline “Mobile Cellular Networks” and the active learning methods that are used in the classes. With these methods students' engagement is increased, they are more focused on the material studied, and more motivated for learning and work. Applying active learning methods also allows the lecturer to measure the level of understanding and to receive valuable feedback. If there are problems with specific parts of the topic, the lecturer can react immediately by adding new explanations or tasks. The paper is concluded with a survey conducted with students in the last academic year (2021-2022, summer semester), presenting the degree of satisfaction of students with the way of teaching the discipline, as well as the results of the exam, assessing students' knowledge.

Keywords:

Distance education, active learning, mobile cellular networks, MATLAB.