Forms of Assessment in view of Development of Mathematical Competencies

During the past twenty years, the need to define outcomes of education as Competences has been recognized in many countries. The European Parliament and the Council of the European Union acknowledged the mathematical competence in 2006 to be a key competence for everyday life (Recommendation of the European Parliament and of the Council of 18 December 2006 on key competences for lifelong learning (2006/962/EC). https://​eur-lex.​europa.​eu/​legal-content/​EN/​TXT/​PDF/​?​uri=​CELEX:​32006H0962&​from=​EN. Last accessed 10 July 2023) and it was incorporated into the national educational programs. The engineering tertiary educational bodies grouped around SEFI, Mathematics Special Interest Group adopted the concept of eight overlaying mathematical competencies introduced by Danish KOM project (Niss M, Mathematical competencies and the learning of mathematics: the Danish KOM project. In: A. Gagatsis, S. Papastravidis (eds.) 3rd Mediterranean conference on mathematics education. Hellenic Mathematical Society and Cyprus Mathematical Society, Athens, Greece, pp 115–124) in 2003 which were linked to the carefully specified core content, and formulated as the core content-related competencies defining learning outcomes in the third edition of “A Framework for Mathematics Curricula in Engineering Education” (Alpers, B. et al., A Framework for Mathematics Curricula in Engineering Education. SEFI, Brussels, (2013)).

The paper deals with appropriate forms of summative assessment, applicable in the higher engineering education. Special attention is paid to mutual communication in a class, a phenomenon that was negatively affected to a large extent by pandemic restrictions. We introduce discussion as a part of summative assessment, not only providing the space for evaluating the mathematical competencies, but more, as an aspect that essentially contributes to their cultivation. The results of a study in which 230 students participated is presented.

The strategy of deploying more assessment forms is discussed, taking into account building of comprehensive Mathematical Competency in gradual continuous and permanent manner.