Persistence and dropout are two sides of the same coin. Together with personal and social factors, issues associated with the quality of teaching provided by universities determine students’ decision to persist in pursuing their academic degree or, on the contrary, to drop out of university studies. Our working hypothesis is that the impact on improving the quality of teaching by considering pedagogical factors which are currently being researched and experimented with, can improve the overall persistence rate by reducing the dropout rate. Our work consisted of applying an instrument designed to diagnose the risk of dropping out of university studies to a sample of first-year university students at the University of Granada. The instrument was applied at the beginning of the second semester. Of the 642 pupils surveyed, we established a risk group of 20 students. In this preliminary study we intend to make a first approach to the phenomenon of academic failure in Andalusian universities from the prediction and diagnosis of risk groups and the recommendation of preventive measures. Among the measures we propose for prevention, we highlight those that have an impact on pedagogical factors. We propose measures targeting the factors that predict dropout and the implementation of preventive measures.
Music has multiple characteristics that make it an ideal tool for teaching and learning languages. Although some research has been done on this subject, there are still many areas to explore. This quantitative research presents survey data from 178 students of Spanish as a Foreign Language to better understand how adult learners use music and other media in their practice of Spanish. Non-parametric statistical tests were carried out. Data showed participants used music more frequently than other media as a means to practice Spanish outside of the classroom, despite having difficulties understanding the lyrics. Also, musical training was found to be an indicator of a higher level of lyrical comprehension. It was concluded that the growing popularity of Spanish language music, changes in music consumption, and the democratization of listening platforms— along with the ability that songs have to generate well-being and to create links, as well as to represent the target culture—were decisive factors in the use of songs in the learning of Spanish as a foreign language.
scite is a Brooklyn-based organization that helps researchers better discover and understand research articles through Smart Citations–citations that display the context of the citation and describe whether the article provides supporting or contrasting evidence. scite is used by students and researchers from around the world and is funded in part by the National Science Foundation and the National Institute on Drug Abuse of the National Institutes of Health.