Learning analytics allow you to get information about students, with the goal of helping them learn better. There a a variety of tools, beyond traditional graded assessments, that provide information about when, where, what, and how students are studying and learning.
There is a lot of information available to instructors using Moodle, and some information available to students. This article post shows some of the information available, and how to access it.
Are students looking at the Moodle course?
A quick glance at the Participant list shows the most recent course access for each of your students. To get a list of the participants, select the Participants link at the top of your course.
Your list will show the most recent access for all course participants.
What activity has each student completed?
If a course has activity completion enabled, instructors can see a quick summary report showing all the activities for the class and which students completed. This information is in Reports –> Activity completion report. Your report will show each activity and which students completed the activity, based upon the completion criteria you set for that resource of activity.
To get access this report, select the Report link at the top of your course and then click on the Activity completion link..
You will see a grid with each activity along the top and each listed in rows.
Which activities are accessed most by your class?
The Reports –> Activity report shows how many times each resource was accessed. This information is available only to teachers and other course builders. It can help in determining which resources students find useful, and which might be removed to make the more important materials standout. Also, it can help instructors see if materials they find important are getting overlooked by the class.
To get access this report, select the Report link at the top of your course and then click on the Activity completion link..
Your report will show each activity and how often it was accessed.
When in the semester are students accessing materials?
Reports –> Statistics shows when students are looking at your Moodle course. This information is available only to teachers and other course builders. We can expect access to spike at the start of the semester and before assignments are due. If the graph something different than that, it may be worth exploring why.
To get access this report, select the Report link at the top of your course and then click on the Statistics link.
Select the options for the statistics you want and hit the view button. You’ll see a graph showing those statistics by date. You may want to show only registered students in your report, to limit the noise in your graph.
Do these analytics respect student privacy?
The suggestions above provide just a few of the many, many options for gathering information via logs and automatically generated reports. These reports are relatively easy to get. However, it is worth thinking about whether it is appropriate to get this information.
If you use analytics, you may want to have an open discussion about the information available and how you find it useful.