One of the most significant changes that entail the arrival of Spanish Universities to the European Space for Higher Education focuses on planning, developing and assessing the teaching and learning processes so that the main participant of such processes is the student. Bearing in mind the fact that the way we teach determines the way we learn, it is important to know the motives and strategies teachers use in their teaching and how these influence the learning needs of students.

Research on approaches to teaching and approaches to learning has shown the different ways in which teachers and students understand these approaches. However, studies carried out to understand existing differences and their implications on the design of a more successful learning environment are minimal, especially in our Spanish context and even more minimal under the new ESHE.

For the last 20 years research into Higher Education has resulted in a body of knowledge and outcomes that have in turn suggested models that try to explain how teaching and learning take place from the protagonists´ perspective (Hernández Pina, 2002, 2004; Hernández Pina et al (2005).These studies may throw some light on new approaches within the European Space for Higher Education (ESHE) with regard to new learning and teaching styles.

Within this context, the main aim of this study is to determine the student learning needs according to cross-sectional competences from the point of view of teachers within the framework of reference of the Bologna Process. In order to achieve this, we have set the following goals:

1.     To study the learning needs from the point of view of teachers.

2.     To study the learning needs from the point of view of teachers according to sex, degree, course year and previous studies.

3.     To analyse the coherence between approaches to teaching and the learning needs identified by teachers.

4.     To analyse the coherence between approaches to teaching and the needs identified by teachers according to sex, degree, course year and previous studies. 

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