Is interactive the teaching in higher education? The perspective of students

Abstract

This study shows the advantages of a style of teaching that is based on dialogue and interaction between students and teachers in the classroom. However, in Spain, interaction as a teaching-learning method is still little used. This paper investigates the status of this method in Higher Education in Spain. An exploratory study was carried out based on fifty in-depth interviews with students from all fields of knowledge in two Spanish universities. The results show that the usual teaching methods of university teaching in the Spanish are based on an expository model and very little use is made of interaction-based learning. There were also few interactive meetings for teaching-learning between students, and between students and the teaching staff outside of classroom time. The results also shows those aspects which both facilitate and hinder interaction. It can be concluded that there is an urgent need to introduce interaction-based teaching-learning practices into Spanish universities. Students demand a methodological change and those who have had some interactive experiences claim to have been more involved in their learning, to have gained a better understanding of the content, to have enjoyed the subject more, and to have obtained better academic results. Interaction-based teaching and learning practices by are essential in the improvement of teaching quality in Spanish higher education.

Keywords

• interacción verbal
• técnica de enseñanza
• enseñanza superior
• debate
• expresión oral