A presentation at the 2016 Minnesota eLearning Summit

1. Bodong Chen,1
Fan Ouyang,1
Yu-Hui Chang,1
& Wanying Zhou2
1
Curriculum & Instruction, University of Minnesota
2
College of Liberal Arts, University of Minnesota
2016 MN eLearning Summit * Minneapolis * July 28, 2016
Fostering Engagement and Reflection
through Social Learning Analytics

2. Context

3. ● Fully online
● Liberal education
● Writing intensive
Instructor Researcher

4. ● How to promote forum participation?
● How to help students become more aware
and reflective of their participation?
(Kuh, 2003)

5. Social Learning Analytics
● Learning Analytics
(Siemens, 2012, 2013)
● Social Learning Analytics
(Buckingham Shum & Ferguson, 2012)
○ Social learning
○ Analytics of/for learning
■ Social network analytics
■ Content analytics
■ …
○ Mostly built for instructors

6. CanvasNet
for students
1. Social engagement -- social network analytics
2. Conceptual engagement -- lexical analytics

7. Canvas
Forums
Google
Drive
Apps Script
CavasNet
Web app
Shiny App
R
Google Sheets R
API
Feedback Loop
Data Analytics
Sense-making

8. Student reflections
Canvas
Forums

9. Student interactions
Canvas
Forums

10. Canvas API
Canvas
Forums
Google
Drive
Apps Script

11. Google Spreadsheet

12. CanvasNet
demo

13. A Pilot Study
● Useful?
● Usable?
● Did it foster social interactions?
● Did it facilitate quality of discussions?

14. Two sections (n = 39)

15. Data and Analyses
Questions Data Analyses
Useful?
Usable?
Student reflection Coding of usage/usefulness
and usability
Social
interactions
Forum logs Social network analysis
Quality of
discussions
Forum posts Coding of speaking
behaviors

16. Results

17. Usefulness
monitor posting behaviors
setting participation goals
did not find it useful
Non-use (esp. Class B)
“CanvasNet was actually interesting...
So in the network summary, I can
check how many [times I interacted]
with a person.”
“I figured out that I was the person
who got the most comments... So I
feel like I have to write comments to
others.”
“I really knew how much time,
thought and energy I had put [in].”

18. Usability
need for additional supports
(procedural & conceptual)
individual variation
“I did not really understand... The big
cloud [has] arrows pointing
everywhere... I [am] not really sure
about how those numbers are
calculated...”
S688: “In CanvasNet, I set up Date
Range ... and found my ID on the
Network map. This is really
interesting and I have 32 replies for
two months. My position on the
network map is in the middle. In
October period, my position is
somewhat changed… ”

19. Social
Interactions
● A vs B, Phase 1: B had higher
degree but also variation
● B, Phase 1 vs 2: decrease--degree;
increase--reciprocity

20. Quality
(in progress)
A single case: S688
● argumentation
● reflection on the group

21. Lessons Learned
Keep it simple
Timing
Pedagogical alignments

22. Students as agents
(Slade, 2013)

23. Know. Make. Play.
(Thomas & Brown, 2011)
● Instructors in the new cultures of learning
● Supports for instructors (e.g., “Learning Analytics Carpentry”)

24. Thank You!
chenbd@umn.edu
@bod0ng