Calculus courses often present a large number of difficulties to undergraduate students of scientific studies, especially in engineering degrees. These difficulties are sometimes related to teaching and assessment strategies. In this paper, a teaching innovation experience is presented within the framework of the Universitat Oberta de Catalunya.…

Universities in Latin American countries are undergoing major changes in its institutional and academic settings. One strategy for continuous improvement of teaching and learning process is the incorporation of methods and teaching aids seeking to develop scientific research skills in students from their undergraduate studies. The aim of this…

We present a strategy for the acquisition and assessment of autonomous learning conducted as part of the Graphic Expression in Engineering (GE) degree course during the first quarter at the Escola Universitària d'Enginyeria Tècnica Industrial de Barcelona (EUETIB). The strategy employed is the puzzle technique in the classroom and multiple-choice…

Freshmen at the Manresa School of Engineering, Escola Politècnica Superior d'Enginyeria de Manresa (EPSEM), of the Universitat Politècnica de Catalunya (UPC) are voluntarily provided with the mentoring service during their initial period at University. Mentoring gives academic, teaching and self-organizational support. It improves academic results…

Physics applets are well known appealing resources to teach and learn physics, and a large number of them are available on the Internet. Nevertheless, not all of them are of the same quality, because such applets do not fit every specific teaching/learning purpose. The start question was which features should have a physics applet in order that it…

Nowadays, the educational methodology known as "peer assessment" constitutes one of the pillars of formative assessment at the different levels of the educational system, particularly at the University level. In fact, in recent years, it has been increasingly used to enhance students' meaningful learning, as it is considered to be an…

Microteaching is a didactic tool of recent application to undergraduate and postgraduate students as a way to promote self-learning. In this work we compared the perceptions of the students who provide instruction in tissue engineering using microteaching and the perceptions of the same students when they receive such instructions. Two similar…

An individual's social style is determined by behavioral patterns in the interactions with their peers. Some studies suggest that social style may influence the way in which an individual's performance is evaluated. We studied the effects that speakers' and evaluators' social styles have on the marks given for end-of-term presentations in a…