Connecting learning analytics with learning research: the role of design-based research

ABSTRACT This paper argues that learning analytics (LA) can make contributions to learning research, in addition to aiming for improvements in learning and teaching practices in a solely applied sense. Indeed, there is potential for transforming learning research if certain approaches developed in LA were used more extensively to study learning. The potential to advance learning research is explored along four dimensions: (1) data quantity, (2) longitudinal data, (3) data from multiple levels, and (4) data from multiple locations. This is followed by a description of how design-based research as practised in the learning sciences can serve as a bridge to LA, and how it would transform LA into a methodology that is also useful for advancing theories and models of learning.

[1]  Andrea A. diSessa,et al.  A History of Conceptual Change Research , 2014 .

[2]  Paul Cobb,et al.  Experimenting to Support and Understand Learning Processes , 2008 .

[3]  B. Latour,et al.  Laboratory Life: The Construction of Scientific Facts , 1979 .

[4]  Lina Markauskaite,et al.  New Learning—Old Methods? How E-research Might Change Technology-Enhanced Learning Research , 2010 .

[5]  Charles Anderson,et al.  The end of theory: The data deluge makes the scientific method obsolete , 2008 .

[6]  Mitchell J. Nathan,et al.  Learning sciences. , 2010, Wiley interdisciplinary reviews. Cognitive science.

[7]  Joseph M. Whitmeyer,et al.  Social Emergence: Societies as Complex Systems , 2006 .

[8]  Peter Reimann,et al.  Time is precious: Variable- and event-centred approaches to process analysis in CSCL research , 2009, Int. J. Comput. Support. Collab. Learn..

[9]  A. Onwuegbuzie,et al.  Mixed Methods Research: A Research Paradigm Whose Time Has Come , 2004 .

[10]  J. Greeno.  THE SITUATIVITY OF KNOWING, LEARNING, AND RESEARCH , 1998 .

[11]  James G. Greeno,et al.  Situativity and learning , 2009 .

[12]  Sasha A. Barab.  Design-based research: A methodological toolkit for engineering change , 2014 .

[13]  Anthony S. Bryk,et al.  2014 AERA Distinguished Lecture , 2015 .

[14]  J. Maxwell.  Causal Explanation, Qualitative Research, and Scientific Inquiry in Education , 2004 .

[15]  R. Yin.  Case Study Research: Design and Methods , 1984 .

[16]  Wolff-Michael Roth,et al.  Limits of Generalizing in Education Research: Why Criteria for Research Generalization Should Include Population Heterogeneity and Uses of Knowledge Claims , 2014, Teachers College Record: The Voice of Scholarship in Education.

[17]  George Siemens,et al.  Learning analytics and educational data mining: towards communication and collaboration , 2012, LAK.

[18]  Ryan S. Baker,et al.  Educational Data Mining and Learning Analytics , 2014 .

[19]  David F. Channell.  Pasteur's Quadrant: Basic Science and Technological Innovation , 1999 .

[20]  Feng Li,et al.  An Introduction to Metaanalysis , 2005 .

[21]  M. Chi,et al.  From things to processes: A theory of conceptual change for learning science concepts , 1994 .

[22]  F. Gobet,et al.  The Cambridge handbook of expertise and expert performance , 2006 .

[23]  T. Wigram,et al.  Therapeutic Songwriting in Music Therapy , 2008 .

[24]  Ton de Jong,et al.  On the quality of knowledge in the field of electricity and magnetism , 1987 .

[25]  Rosemary Luckin,et al.  The learner centric ecology of resources: A framework for using technology to scaffold learning , 2008, Comput. Educ..

[26]  R. Burt,et al.  Social network analysis: foundations and frontiers on advantage. , 2013, Annual review of psychology.

[27]  Michael J. Jacobson,et al.  Emergence of learning in computer-supported, large-scale collective dynamics: a research agenda , 2007, CSCL.

[28]  R. Keith Sawyer,et al.  The Cambridge Handbook of the Learning Sciences: Index , 2014 .

[29]  J. Johnstone.  Supersizing the Mind , 2013 .

[30]  A. Wise,et al.  Why Theory Matters More than Ever in the Age of Big Data , 2015, J. Learn. Anal..

[31]  Rebecca Ferguson,et al.  Social Learning Analytics , 2012, J. Educ. Technol. Soc..

[32]  P. V. Geert,et al.  A dynamic systems model of basic developmental mechanisms: Piaget, Vygotsky, and beyond , 1998 .

[33]  Koeno Gravemeijer,et al.  Design research from a learning design perspective , 2006 .

[34]  Manu Kapur,et al.  Conceptualizing Debates in Learning and Educational Research: Toward a Complex Systems Conceptual Framework of Learning , 2016 .

[35]  Ryan S. Baker,et al.  The State of Educational Data Mining in 2009: A Review and Future Visions. , 2009, EDM 2009.

[36]  Ellen B. Mandinach,et al.  A Perfect Time for Data Use: Using Data-Driven Decision Making to Inform Practice , 2012 .

[37]  Kenneth R. Koedinger,et al.  A Data Repository for the EDM Community: The PSLC DataShop , 2010 .

[38]  David J. Silverman,et al.  Qualitative Research, 3rd edition , 2010 .

[39]  Peter Maurer,et al.  The Cambridge Handbook of the Learning Sciences , 2022 .

[40]  A. Clark,et al.  Supersizing The Mind Embodiment Action And Cognitive Extension Andy Clark , 2016 .

[41]  William A. Sandoval,et al.  Conjecture Mapping: An Approach to Systematic Educational Design Research , 2014 .

[42]  Hendrik Drachsler,et al.  Translating Learning into Numbers: A Generic Framework for Learning Analytics , 2012, J. Educ. Technol. Soc..

[43]  Susan Bull,et al.  Integrating and Visualising Diagnostic Information for the Benefit of Learning , 2015 .

[44]  Tobias Hansson Wahlberg.  Elder-Vass on the Causal Power of Social Structures , 2014 .

[45]  Jeremy Roschelle,et al.  From New Technological Infrastructures to Curricular Activity Systems: Advanced Designs for Teaching and Learning , 2010 .

[46]  J. Maxwell.  Using Qualitative Methods for Causal Explanation , 2004 .

[47]  L. Hedges,et al.  Introduction to Meta‐Analysis , 2009, International Coaching Psychology Review.

[48]  Jonathan P. Rowe,et al.  When Off-Task is On-Task: The Affective Role of Off-Task Behavior in Narrative-Centered Learning Environments , 2011, AIED.

[49]  D. Anthony.  Evidence-based Policy: A Realist Perspective , 2007 .

[50]  P. Benner.  The Cambridge Handbook of Situated Cognition: Book Review , 2010 .

[51]  Peter Reimann.  Design-Based Research—Designing as Research , 2013 .

[52]  Robert J. Crutcher,et al.  The role of deliberate practice in the acquisition of expert performance. , 1993 .

[53]  Richard S. Prawat,et al.  Dewey, Peirce, and the Learning Paradox , 1999 .

[54]  Andrea A. diSessa,et al.  The Cambridge Handbook of the Learning Sciences: A History of Conceptual Change Research , 2005 .

[55]  A. Kelly.  Design Research in Education: Yes, but is it Methodological? , 2004 .

[56]  A. Hewison.  Evidence-Based Policy , 2008, Policy, politics & nursing practice.

[57]  George Siemens,et al.  The Cambridge Handbook of the Learning Sciences: Educational Data Mining and Learning Analytics , 2014 .