Active methodologies in incoming programming classes

Innovative approaches in teaching programming have been required to improve the success of incoming programming students. This work presents the initial results of a teaching strategy implemented in the Algorithms subject of a Computer Science course. Ninety-five students, enrolled in this subject during the first semester of the course, participated in the research. The reported activity is related with active methodologies of teaching and Problem-Based Learning, being developed on the first day of class in groups of up to five students. The activity was based in two actions: 1) answering a questionnaire associating computing elements to daily life routines; and, 2) even without programming concepts knowledge, develop a smartphone application. Each group received a questionnaire containing 19 questions, divided into four blocks. What can be perceived with the accomplishment of this work, was the enthusiasm, motivation and engagement of the students who, even being unknown from each other, organized themselves in the groups and researched the necessary strategies to complete the challenge. The teacher acted as an advisor in the teaching process, conducting the experiment in order to lead students to find the solution.This work has been supported by FCT - Fundação para a Ciência e Tecnologia within the Projects Scopes: UIDB/05757/2020 and UIDB/00319/2020.