Innovations in geomatics teaching during the COVID-19 emergency

The approach in the teaching process is changing, thanks to the increased awareness that a higher students' involvement leads to a better quality of their learning. The aim is to make the students more participative, avoiding a unidirectional lesson and encouraging their wish to keep updated on the course advancements. However, innovative teaching methodologies are not yet widespread, mainly in STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics) disciplines. At the University of Genoa, the experimentation of innovative teaching techniques has been significant and worthy especially because it was planned before the COVID-19 emergency and applied in the scenario of forced remote teaching. Thanks to the introduction of novel technological instruments, several techniques have been exploited to realize interactive lessons and promoting students' involvement. The present work discloses the employed techniques and frames them within the state of the art of innovative teaching, highlighting their contribution in the teaching activities related to the Geomatics field of knowledge. The acquired experiences in Geomatics dissemination and a critical analysis, including teachers' and students' perception about the tested innovative teaching/learning tools, are also reported. In general, the innovations introduced in teaching and learning processes during the COVID-19 sanitary emergency were warmly received by the entire community, including teachers, students, and teaching assistants.