Learning Analytics: A Case Study of a Web-Enhanced Course
Open Access
- Author:
- Romanowski, Brittney Renea
- Area of Honors:
- Information Sciences and Technology
- Degree:
- Bachelor of Science
- Document Type:
- Thesis
- Thesis Supervisors:
- Dr. Abdullah Konak, Thesis Supervisor
Jeanne Marie Rose, Thesis Honors Advisor - Keywords:
- Learning Analytics
Google Analytics
Analytics - Abstract:
- Online learning has grown steadily over the past few years, and the use of learning analytics has grown in parallel. As online education continues to grow, so does the need to improve student learning online and the need to understand students’ interaction in their electronic learning environment. This thesis first explored previously conducted research on online learning environments and the learning analytics tools implemented on them, as well as online environments that Google Analytics has been implemented in. This study then explored and tested the implementation of Google Analytics as a learning analytics tool on a course website at Penn State Berks, IST 210. Google Analytics was used to record student event data on the course website in order to better understand how the students interacted with it. In order to analyze patterns and trends, the data recorded by Google Analytics was exported into a statistical analysis tool, SPSS. Each of the pages on the IST 210 website was categorized by five main interactive characteristics. This categorization framework allowed for certain student usage behaviors to be compared to the different types of pages. This thesis shows how the application of Google Analytics can be a valid tool used to observe and improve student learning online.