4.1 Introduction
As instructors, we all want our students to feel excited about our course content, and sometimes we use the word “engagement” to indicate motivation, curiosity, and excitement. We need to keep in mind that learning analytics do not provide insight into a student’s motivation. Instead, learning analytics can give us insight into the behaviors and skills that are indicators of students' success or struggle.
Our responsibility as instructors is to create a learning experience that requires students to interact with the content, to practice, and show their learning. Learning analytics can give us insights and indicators that prompt us to ask, what's going on here? Is there something that I should change? Is there some action I should take? The data can help us frame relevant, timely questions. Sometimes, our students are the only ones who can answer these questions.
Diversity, Equity, Inclusion, & Justice tip
Engagement will present differently across contexts and populations. For example, the data for a particular class may indicate that a student has been accessing a file less frequently than their peers, looking like lower engagement, when in reality the student lives with low vision and requires the materials to be printed for offline reading. Another student's data may suggest that they're accessing the course less frequently than their peers, but during that shortened time they're highly engaged -- their time is just limited by working a job or taking care of family.