No abstract

Current pedagogical trends move towards the implementation of active methodologies; however, little research has been conducted in the field of history teaching. Purely memorised learning no longer has a place in today’s age of information and technology. Simulating the role of historians in the classroom, what is known as promoting historical thinking, makes more sense. Thus, training teachers on how to develop historical thinking by active methodologies such as error-based learning (EBL) becomes necessary. Moreover, the traditional summative test does not demonstrate the assessment of the level of historical thinking. Nevertheless, technology enables formative assessment by different techniques and tools such as learning analytics (LA). Then, to analyse the potential of combining EBL and LA to foster and evaluate historical thinking can be interesting. To this end, in the present quantitative quasi-experimental study, the impact of EBL and LA to encourage and assess historical thinking skills have been analysed with 107 pre-service teachers. To this end, while 66 students worked with EBL with sources where errors were introduced in a controlled way, the other 41 students worked with the same unmodified sources. At the end of each session, LA was used to analyse the students’ level of knowledge in the six dimensions of historical thinking through interactive questionnaires. The results obtained show an improvement in the historical thinking of future teachers due to the use of EBL. Furthermore, it has been proven that the data obtained from the LA enables predicting the results obtained by the students in a later test. In this way, the usefulness of active methodologies such as EBL combined with LA in the training of future teachers in our area of knowledge contrasts with the methods currently used.

En la actualidad, es cada vez más habitual la incorporación de acciones educativas de carácter lúdico a los procesos de aprendizaje, entre los que destaca especialmente la gamificación. A pesar de ello, con frecuencia en estos proyectos no se presta la suficiente atención a la evaluación del aprendizaje producido durante el propio proceso de enseñanza; recurriéndose normalmente a sistemas de evaluación sumativos, como son, por ejemplo, los tradicionales exámenes, al finalizar el proyecto. En el presente estudio pre-experimental, a partir de una metodología mixta y en el contexto de una unidad didáctica gamificada con 24 alumnos de 6º curso de Educación Primaria en la asignatura de Ciencias Naturales, se evalúa el potencial de un sistema de evaluación formativo gamificado a través del uso de puntos de experiencia y de la renovación tecnológica del tradicional diario de clase o cuaderno del profesor. Los resultados evidencian que este sistema es efectivo tanto para la evaluación del rendimiento académico, como para la evaluación de aspectos educativos transversales como son el trabajo cooperativo, el interés en clase o la revisión de tareas diarias. Además, los resultados revelan que el alumnado muestra un alto nivel de motivación con la dinámica gamificada implementada durante el estudio.

Information and communication technology has produced changes in the demands of modern-day society (e.g., most jobs will require advanced digital skills in the short term). In addition, nowadays, new active methodologies using emerging technologies are being put into practice. However, little research has been conducted with pre-service teachers, particularly in the teaching of history. This quantitative study analysed the impact of the implementation of a mixed methodology using inquiry-based learning and a student response system (SRS) for the formative assessment of the academic achievement of 240 prospective primary teachers of history. The application of this mixed methodology shows better academic results than traditional lecture-based teaching. In addition, students’ scores achieved through use of the SRS predicted the scores of male students in the final exam; however, this was not in the case for females. Implications for practice or policy: The introduction of information and communication technology into history teaching brings active learning environments in higher education. Pre-service teachers can improve their knowledge of history through the implementation of inquiry-based learning methodology and SRSs. Our results indicate that an SRS can be an effective tool for teachers to carry out students' formative assessment. Teachers can effectively use SRS scores to predict male students' performance in history, but not female performance.

Su principal campo de investigación se desarrolla en la cromatografía, pero además desarrolla otra línea de investigación relacionada con la enseñanza-aprendizaje de la física y la química. Su labor investigadora ha dado lugar a más de 70 artículos publicados en revistas indexadas de alto impacto y 5 tesis doctorales dirigidas. Es autora de 7 patentes, ha participado y dirigido numerosos proyectos de investigación y ha impartido cursos y conferencias en diversas universidades internacionales.