FísicActiva: applying active learning strategies to a large engineering lecture

ABSTRACT

This paper presents and analyses the results obtained by applying Active Learning techniques in overcrowded Physics lectures at the University of the Republic, Uruguay. The course referred to is Physics 1, the first Physics course that all students of the Faculty of Engineering take in their first semester for all the Engineering-related careers. Qualitative and quantitative data corresponding to three semesters are shown and discussed, indicating that the students that attended these lectures outperformed the students that followed the course in the traditional way: the pass rates increased, whereas the failure rates decreased. The students highly valued this methodology, in particular, the interactive and relaxed dynamics, highlighting the concern of professors to answer questions by means of new questions so as to promote reasoning. The results obtained point to a work path that deserves to be deepened and extended to other Engineering courses.

KEYWORDS:

• Active learning
• dialogic learning
• motivation
• engineering education

Acknowledgements

We are grateful to the students who participated in this experience.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by Comisión Sectorial de Enseñanza (CSE): “Proyectos de Mejora de la Calidad de enseñanza de Grado: Innovaciones Educativas - Año 2014.”