At university, most classes can be categorised as lectures (where you sit in a theatre and take down notes by a lecturer) and "the rest".
Most classes of "the rest" are something like tutorials (exactly the same as classes in school), seminars (which may include presentations or themes for every week), lab work (where you're using PCs, chemicals, bio stuff, etc), etc.
In the rest, you're expected to do any assigned work, eg readings or taking notes, and then participate in any discussions and activities that are set in the class.
Doing work for the class and then participating in the class itself is essentially what the mark is based on.
Your style of classes depends entirely on the nature of the subject itself; most languages, for examples, are usually tutorial-style, ie they are like a class at school. Things like history will usually involve one or two lectures plus a tutorial. In these classes, I'd be marked based on my preparation and participation.