Improving teaching and learning in higher education ? By Vaneeta D'Andrea & David Gosling

2007 ◽  
Vol 38 (6) ◽  
pp. 1138-1139
Author(s):  
Pete Cannell
Author(s):  
Deborah West ◽  
Zaidatun Tasir ◽  
Ann Luzeckyj ◽  
Kew Si Na ◽  
Danny Toohey ◽  
...  

Several studies have been conducted to evaluate the experience and involvement of academics in learning analytics (LA) due to its potential for improving teaching and learning. However, findings often reflect an educational culture which is indicative of the institutional or national context where the study has occurred, resulting in bias regarding LA perspectives. Therefore, this study seeks to compare and contrast the experiences of LA among academics in Australia and Malaysia, with intentions to learn from each other’s experience. Areas of comparison were: (1) academics’ involvement in LA activities; (2) academics’ responses to the institutional capacity in supporting LA; and 3) academics’ concerns about the ethical issues surrounding LA. A survey of 353 Australian and 224 Malaysian academics revealed similarities and differences. It is evident from these results that the context and infrastructure for LA are at different stages of development in both countries. Nevertheless, the results provide an interesting reflection on academics’ needs, institutional understanding, policies, and educational cultural biases in applying LA in teaching and learning in higher education institutions.


In a formal online learning course in higher education, learners usually respond to both assignments and assessments in order to achieve the learning and to provide evidence of their progress. In a learning management system (LMS) instance, analysts may access (1) high-level descriptions of selected features of the assignments and assessments through an administrator-accessed data portal (and a reports section), and they may access (2) close-in descriptions from the learner-facing side. This chapter describes an exploration of the assignments and assessments in a live LMS instance, based on both high-level and close-in analyses; systematized approaches to harness such information to benefit teaching and learning; and proposes some tentative ways to improve teaching and learning for the particular university.


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