Abstract:

Based on an understanding that University can and should build environments that favor global development of students, this article describes the process of implementing problem-based learning (PBL) and students’ perceptions regarding its effectiveness. PBL is an innovative learning methodology, within experiential learning, which has been widely used in several universities, as well as in different scientific areas (e.g., medicine, engineering). However, despite the attraction of the PBL throughout the scientific world, specific investigations about its effectiveness, in the context of Sports Sciences, in Portugal, have been very limited. 48 students participated in this study, of both genres, 41 of whom were attending the undergraduate course in Sports and Physical Activity Sciences, in the 1st (n = 26) and 2nd (n = 15), and 7 attending the 1st year of Exercise Physiology master's degree. These students participated and evaluated six different Case Studies using PBL methodology, allowing the analysis of 211 records, which were the sample of this study. PBL intervention lasted 1 week, in blocks of 2 hours daily, with small groups of students (8 to 12), during which the more traditional model of classes is replaced by the analysis, discussion and resolution of a practical case, properly framed and formulated together with an expert in the field of study in question. Throughout PBL sessions, one teacher facilitated the group discussion, defining what are facts (all the concrete data that students discover about the case), hypotheses (all possible explanations for the problem presented) and learning needs (all concepts, and relationships between concepts, that students do not show to master in the course of each session). On the last day of the practical case, students, in groups of two or three, made an oral presentation of 10 minutes per group, addressing the problem-solving process, defined and related the concepts that supported the explanation of the case, for each of the curricular units involved. At the end of each session, except for the last, teacher distributed a learning need to each of the students, corresponding to an individual assignment. At the beginning of the sessions, except for the first, two or three learning needs were read by the respective student, allowing deeper discussion about the case. At the end of the last session, students were asked to complete a seventeen-item questionnaire, with a 5-point Likert Scale varying between '0-Nothing' and '5-Very’ and supported by Bloom's taxonomy. This taxonomy presupposes, at the end of the teaching-learning process, the new skills and new knowledge that students must have acquired, organized around three educational domains: cognitive, affective and psychomotor. The exploratory factor analysis showed that the evaluation questionnaire adequately assessed the cognitive domain (KMO=0.928, p<.001), with students considering that PBL allows 'to seek knowledge through scientific research' (4.31±.8) , 'to favor listening and valuing different points of view' (4.17±.8), 'to identify and interpret problems in professional practice' (4.12±.8), and 'to use theories, concepts, methods, and content learned in problem solving' (4.11±.7). These results showed that PBL is an alternative method of teaching and learning in Sports Sciences, facilitating the learning process and, beneficial towards autonomous and independent learning and, consequently, the global development of students.

Keywords:

Problem-Based Learning, Sport Sciences, Assessment of learning, College Students, Active Methodologies, Experiential Learning.