New Perspectives in Science Education

Socio-constructivist theory of learning argues that learning involves the construction of knowledge and that learners must actively seek to create meaning from their own experiences by relating new information to what they already know. Effective learning is more likely when students are given, and accept responsibility for, their own learning and have some control over the learning context. Problem-based learning (PBL) refers to any learning environment in which the problem drives the learning, because it is posed in such a way that students realize they need to acquire new knowledge before the problem can be solved. This paper presents the experience of a structured problem-based learning approach to the teaching of a study module on Thermodynamics as engineering science in some graduate programs at the University of Burgos. The study module is taught using a structured PBL approach. Distributed in teams of four to five people, the students start working with very simple, clearly defined problems and gradually moved on to more complex ones. The PBL approach involves an assessment process, concerning three types of activities evaluated, which is progressive and cumulative and provides frequent feedback to the students. The aim of the paper is to show that this progressive assessment is more adequate to the learning profile of the average student in comparison with a constant rate assessment. Data collected from sets of 45-50 students along the academic years 2011-12 and 2012-13 have been used to perform the study. Comparison with previous data from topics taught using PBL, but with constant rate assessment, is presented.