Abstract:

A social group that does not have the culture of savings, does not know how to plan its incomes as well as its expenses or does not know why or how to acquire a debt, will not be able to improve its social welfare. That is why Economic and Financial Education – EFE is an option to teach citizens how to be able to be aware and responsible for their decisions, since irresponsible financial behavior and deficient financial skills imply the appearance of debts, in adults and young people. Unfortunately, Colombia was ranked 58 out of 79 in the PISA tests, which shows negative results about these issues. Therefore, a group of researchers from Universidad Industrial de Santander – UIS (Colombia) made a diagnosis with a sample of 1,016 high school seniors from 13 educational institutions in the department of Santander. This research was to learn about their economic and financial skills and knowledge. In addition, 13 focus groups were held with teachers to find out the didactic planning of these institutions in relation to the processes of the teaching of EFE. According to the results, several weaknesses were evidenced in the didactic planning on EFE issues in most of the institutions, which turns out into some deficiencies in the economic and financial skills and knowledge of the students. Thus, the results were presented showing the students’ weaknesses and strengths, taking into account a document named Pedagogical Orientations published by the Ministry of Education in Colombia. Based on these results, the design of a gamified tool (videogame) is being carried out during 2021 so that, EFE processes of teaching and learning can be supported to improve students’ knowledge.

Keywords:

Education, Educational needs, Developing, Teacher competencies, Finances.