Leveraging Analytics
Learning Analytics in Canvas and Panopto
Digital platforms capture and store students’ detailed activity within the platform elements, modules and learning materials, allowing to aggregate data points such as page views, clicks, and timestamps. The resulting large data sets are referred to as learning analytics and have been widely used with the objective of investigating and improving learning and teaching processes. Learning analytics data identify indicators of student learning that can be aggregated over time for a single student or across many students in a course. This allows instructors to identify patterns of engagement (or lack thereof).
- In Canvas, the ‘New Analytics’ link allows instructors to open a window into their students’ online activities within the course.
- In Panopto, the ‘Stats’ button gives insights into the views and downloads a video received.
Learning analytics should be used with caution: The data points and patterns that the algorithm privileges and identifies as evidence of learning do not clearly map onto disciplinary understandings of what learning looks like. Further, the programs and data infrastructures undergirding learning analytic systems cannot account for students or educators whose activities do not register as digital signals within the respective platform.
For example, if the student downloads a video or transcript or if they open an embedded tool - for example VoiceThread or Padlet - in a separate tab, their activities will not register in the Canvas Learning Analytics. In the online MSW program, students have the opportunity to download the slides and the transcript of a lecture video - watching the video is not the only way to engage with the content.
Panopto
If you are creating videos for your students, you may want to make sure these are actually viewed, and perhaps detect patterns of engagement and interest among your content offerings.
First, click the stats icon to access analytics.
You can then access a specific time period to see how many views and unique views your material received.
Canvas
Instructors can view detailed analytics for each student, including page views, participation, and current grades.
To access this data, click 'New Analytics' on the course homepage.
To gain insights into student learning, the most useful tab is 'Weekly Online Activity'. You can look at the graph for a general overview of the semester. The data table offers more detail and can be accessed by selecting the three vertical dots on the right-hand side of the screen.
To drill down into the data, select a week of interest and click on either page views or participations.
You can also check the students tab and sort the course participants by page views. This will let you see who the most and who the least online engaged participants are in your course. Again, remember that many learning activities will not leave a digital trace in the learning management system, and use these data points with caution.