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Computer and Study Skills

Code: 101207 ECTS Credits: 6
2024/2025
Degree Type Year
2500894 Tourism FB 1

Contact

Name:
Tatiana López Orozco
Email:
tatiana.lopez@uab.cat

Teachers

Giuseppe Simone Pedote

Teaching groups languages

You can view this information at the end of this document.


Prerequisites

None


Objectives and Contextualisation

  1. Provide students with fundamental study and communication skills for their learning, research, and practice.
  2. Improve students' computer literacy, their basic understanding of operating systems, and a working knowledge of software commonly used in academic and professional settings.
  3. Provide tools for efficient use of online resources. Select documents and be critical of the information, including in their work a critical perspective analyzing relevant issues for the tourism and hotel industry such as gender perspectives, sustainability, and social innovation, among others.
  4. Develop criteria to organize and present different types of works in academic and professional environments.
  5. Learn to organize information efficiently in the form of diagrams, charts, etc., using the appropriate software.
  6. Develop skills to present ideas, papers, and reports effectively and efficiently.

Competences

  • Adapt to ongoing technological changes.
  • Demonstrate understanding of the impact of information systems on business management processes.
  • Develop a capacity for independent learning.
  • Self-assess the knowledge acquired.
  • Use communication techniques at all levels.
  • Work in a team.

Learning Outcomes

  1. Adapt to ongoing technological changes.
  2. Demonstrate understanding of the impact of information systems on business management processes.
  3. Develop a capacity for independent learning.
  4. Self-assess the knowledge acquired.
  5. Use communication techniques at all levels.
  6. Work in a team.

Content

  1. Introduction
    • From High School to College: Changing Demands and Skills
    • Expectations about written works in the university.
    • Carry out successful research considering relevant issues such as social innovation, gender perspective and sustainability in studies in the hotel and tourism sectors.
    • Evaluate sources and manage information.
    • Tools to manage time and get organized: Trello, Asana, Google calendar.
    • Effective study methods: The Pomodoro method, Eisenhower matrix.
  2. Use of the Internet for academic purposes.
    • Online Research Tools
    • Bibliographic management - How to cite properly.
    • The problem of plagiarism in academic papers.
    • File management and storage.
    • Social networks and shared knowledge.
  3. Introduction to operative systems
    • Basic definitions
    • Windows and other operating systems.
    • Windows applications
  4. Written works and word processors.
    • How to make and present a written work.
    • Work with Word (creation and editing of documents, formatting, editing and inserting elements, tools, tables, emails, citations and references).
  5. Work with data and spreadsheets
    • Store, organize and work with data.
    • Work with Excel (basics, create spreadsheets, create graphs and charts, functions and formulas)
  6. Academic and professional presentations.
    • Design an effective presentation.
    • Work with PowerPoint (create slides and insert text objects, work with other objects on slides, SmartArt graphics, images, the slide show, edit the layout of slide templates)
    • How to overcome nerves when giving a presentation.

Activities and Methodology

Title Hours ECTS Learning Outcomes
Type: Directed      
Public presentations 3 0.12 2, 5, 6
Theoretical and practical sessions with ICT support; active participation of students in class. 43 1.72 1, 2, 4, 5
Type: Supervised      
Tutorship 20 0.8 2, 4, 5
Type: Autonomous      
Individual study and practical sessions 30 1.2 1, 2, 3, 4

Teaching languages
Degree in Tourism: Spanish
Degree in Tourism in English: English

The course has three teaching and learning methods:

  1. Theoretical sessions
    • During the classes, the concepts will be explained theoretically and exemplified with practical applications. Most sessions will require student participation to discuss and solve problems.
  2. Practice sessions.
    • During these sessions, the topics covered in the theoretical sessions will be reviewed through exercises, group projects and individual tests that will be carried out throughout the course. Case studies related to tourism will be presented and variables specific to this industry will be analyzed.
    • Students will receive guidance from the teacher to carry out a project that involves the use of statistical and computer skills. Students will be encouraged to choose within their research topics gender and sustainability perspectives that are key in the sector. Specialized software will be used as much as possible during the sessions.
  3. Self-learning
    • The Virtual Campus will be used as a complement and as an alternative means of communication between students and teachers. All relevant course material, examples and exercises will be attached online.
    • Each student must manage their time to study and solve the proposed problems, in addition to working on a research project using statistical data in the tourism sector that will be presented at the end of the course.

Annotation: Within the schedule set by the centre or degree programme, 15 minutes of one class will be reserved for students to evaluate their lecturers and their courses or modules through questionnaires.


Assessment

Continous Assessment Activities

Title Weighting Hours ECTS Learning Outcomes
Individual assignments 50% 30 1.2 1, 2, 4
Midterm exam 1 15% 2 0.08 1, 2, 3, 4, 5
Midterm exam 2 15% 2 0.08 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6
Undertake a basic research project 20% 20 0.8 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6

Students can choose between continuous assessment or direct access to the final exam (a single final assessment).

A) CONTINUOUS ASSESSMENT

The continuous assessment system involves the periodic presentation of individual and group work and activities, in addition to the completion of two partial exams to consolidate the concepts and topics developed in class with a value for each of 15% of the grade. In order to average the results obtained in these two partial exams, the student must achieve a minimum score equal to or greater than 4 points in both exams.

The Virtual Campus will detail the delivery dates of the work and the completion of the two partial exams.

Students who do not pass the subject through continuous evaluation will be evaluated by the single evaluation system, not taking into account the grades obtained previously.

B) SINGLE EVALUATION: Final exam (all subject).

Date and time are established according to the academic calendar, in the Official Program of the Center.

There will be a single type of final exam, without differentiation between students who have passed the continuous assessment and those who have not.

C) RE-ASSESSMENT:

Day and time established according to the academic calendar, in the Official Program of the Center.

Students who have obtained a grade equal to or greater than 3.5 and less than 5 in the final evaluation may take the re-evaluation.


Bibliography

  • Anon (2021) Turismo desde una perspectiva sostenible y el riesgo de la covid-19: Impactos, análisis y posibles intervenciones. Bookwire GmbH. Disponible online
  • Alexander, Michael, Dick Kusleika, and John Walkenbach. (2019) Excel 2019 Bible.1st edition. Indianapolis, IN: Wiley, 2019. Print. Available online
  • Burton, G. (2013) Presenting: deliver presentations with confidence. London: Collins.
  • Bustinduy, I. (2014). Presentaciones efectivas: técnicas para la exposición oral de trabajos y proyectos académicos.. Editorial UOC. Disponible online
  • Cottrell, S. (2003) The Study Skills Handbook. 2nd ed. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan. [4a ed. publicada 2013]
  • Creme, P. and Lea, Mary R. (1997) Writing at University: A Guide for Students. Buckingham: Open University Press.
  • Figueroa-Domecq, C., & Segovia-Perez, M. (2020). Application of a gender perspective in tourism research: A theoretical and practical approach. Revista De Analisis Turistico, 27(2), 251-270. doi:https://doi.org/10.1108/JTA-02-2019-0009 Available online
  • Grauer R., Hogan L, and Poatsy M.A. (2011) Exploring Microsoft Office. Getting Started with Windows 7. Pearson Education, Inc., Publishing as Prentice Hall.
  • Grauer R., Hulett, M. and Poatsy M.A. (2011) Exploring Microsoft Office Word 2010, Prentice Hall. Pearson Education, Inc., Publishing as Prentice Hall.
  • Johnson K. (2010) Student Writing Guide.  Reading, Research and Writing Strategies. University of Minnesota.
  • Liu, Liu, Y., Wang, Y., & Pan, C. (2019). Hot topics and emerging trends in tourism forecasting research: Ascientometric review. Tourism Economics : the Business and Finance of Tourism and Recreation, 25(3), 448–468. https://doi.org/10.1177/1354816618810564 Available online
  • McMillan, K. and Weyers, J. (2006) The Smarter Student: Study Skills and Strategies for Success at University. Harlow: Pearson Education
  • Morales Vallejo, Pedro. “Trabajos Escritos. El Problema Del Plagio.” Miscelánea Comillas 79.154 (2021): 83–107. Disponible online
  • Murray, N. (2008) Writting up your university assignments and research projects: a practical handbook. Maidenhead, Berks: Open University Press: McGraw-Hill. Available online
  • Wallace, M. (2004) Study skills in English: a course in reading skills for academic purposes. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2004

Software

Microsoft Office (Word, Excel, PowerPoint)


Language list

Name Group Language Semester Turn
(TE) Theory 1 Spanish first semester morning-mixed
(TE) Theory 2 English first semester morning-mixed