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Learning Research Updates

Closing the Learning Analytics Loop with Advising & Interventions – Interactive Infographic Poster Prezi, Recorded Presentation & Full Paper

February 6, 2019
Alex Ambrose

Click here to download and zoom into the infographic poster presentation as a pdf
Click here to watch on Youtube the 19 min full recorded presentation at the Learning Analytics Conference. Click here to access the interactive infographic visual tour via Prezi

For the full research paper see:

Syed, M., Anggara, T., Duan, X., Lanski, A., Chawla, N. & Ambrose, G. A. (2018) Learning Analytics Modular Kit: A Closed Loop Success Story in Boosting Students Proceedings of the International Conference on Learning Analytics & Knowledge

Abstract

Identifying non-thriving students and intervening to boost them are two processes that recent literature suggests should be more tightly integrated. We perform this integration over six semesters in a First Year Experience (FYE) course with the aim of boosting student success, by using an integrated closed-loop learning analytics scheme that consists of multiple steps broken into three main phases, as follows: Architecting for Collection (steps: design, build, capture), Analyzing for Action (steps: identify, notify, boost), and Assessing for Improvement (steps: evaluate, report). We close the loop by allowing later steps to inform earlier ones in real-time during a semester and iteratively year to year, thereby improving the course from data-driven insights. This process depends on the purposeful design of an integrated learning environment that facilitates data collection, storage, and analysis. Methods for evaluating the effectiveness of our analytics-based student interventions show that our criterion for identifying non-thriving students was satisfactory and that non-thriving students demonstrated more substantial changes from mid-term to final course grades than already-thriving students. Lastly, we make a case for using early performance in the FYE as an indicator of overall performance and retention of first-year students.