1. Using Learning Analytics in Personalized Learning
Ryan S. Baker
University of Pennsylvania

2. What are we talking about when we talk about personalized learning?
Same words, so many different meanings

3. Analogy: False cognates in language

4. Analogy: False cognates in language
Embaraçada in Portguese: Embarrassed

5. Analogy: False cognates in language
Embaraçada in Portguese: Embarrassed
Embarazada in Spanish: Pregnant

6. What is personalized learning?
Multi-dimensional as Gregg pointed out earlier

7. What is personalized learning?
Personalizing learning to student interests
Gregg’s term: relevance
Personalizing learning to student knowledge
Gregg’s term: proficiency

8. What is personalized learning?
A lot of schools using computer systems that personalize learning based on knowledge
Today I will discuss these systems and the opportunities and challenges they create for teachers and schools

9. We want every student to succeed
How can we help struggling students?

10. How can we help struggling students?
Consider a classroom learning about algebraic equations

11. How can we help struggling students?
In a class of 24 students working with problems like
X + 2X = 12
3X + 2X = 20

12. How can we help struggling students?
Perhaps five students will have the common difficulty in understanding that X = 1X

13. How can we help struggling students?
Perhaps five students will have the common difficulty in understanding that X = 1X
And therefore will have trouble realizing that X + 2X = 3X

14. It’s not very efficient
For the teacher to talk to the entire class about a difficulty that less than 20% of them might have.

15. It’s not very efficient
For the teacher to talk to the entire class about a difficulty that less than 20% of them might have.
And what if – by chance – none of the students have that difficulty this year?

16. But…
Ignoring a potential student difficulty isn’t a very good solution either

17. One option
The teacher could wait until homework or the test to find out, and then give feedback

18. One option
The teacher could wait until homework or the test to find out, and then give feedback
But that’s a long time for the student to wait…

19. Personalized Learning Systems Can Help

20. These systems offer Immediate feedback and support to student
Focus student on material the student will most benefit from learning now
Is this in contradiction to CIL’s definition of personalized learning, where students have more control over learning pathways?
Information that teachers can use
Based on the information automatically collected as the student works in the system

21. Information Distilled Through
Learning Analytics/Educational Data Mining (Baker & Siemens, 2014)
Distillation of models that can infer student knowledge, cognition, engagement from their behavior within personalized learning system
These models can predict variables associated with long-term student achievement (San Pedro et al., 2013, 2015)
Communication of that information to teachers and other school personnel

22. New teaching practices enabled

23. Proactive Remediation (Miller et al., 2015)
Teacher gets up-to-the-minute data from learning system
Teacher determines that several students have made the same mistake
Teacher immediately discusses the problem with these students
While rest of class continues ongoing activity

24. Adapting Non-Computerized Activities (Feng & Heffernan, 2006)
Review which problems students had difficulty with during homework
Discuss these problems in class
Nice video example of this by Kim Kelly, a math teacher in Leominster, Massachusetts

25. Identifying Missing Prerequisites (Canfield, 2001)
At the beginning of the school year, learning system quickly evaluates students using brief computer-adaptive test
Teacher is notified if students are missing prerequisite skills they should already know
Giving teacher an opportunity to prevent student from falling behind right at the start of the year

26. Better Results Obtained in Stringent Studies
Cognitive Tutor Algebra (Pane et al., 2015)
ASSISTments (Roschelle et al., 2016)
ALEKS (Hu et al., 2012; Craig et al., 2013)
Redbird (Suppes et al., 2013, 2014)

27. Why These Systems Work

28. Much More Information Available
A teacher might see a student make a single error in a whole-class activity
A computer program will see the student’s answers and pattern of hint requests on several problems

29. More Timely Information
A teacher isn’t able to grade homework until the following day (or longer)
A computer program can grade the student in real-time

30. Less Work for the Teacher
A teacher grading dozens of homework assignments doesn’t have the time to study each student’s homework assignment for patterns of errors
A computer program can automatically search for patterns of errors identified by experts

31. Students Can Make Progress Even When Teacher is Helping Someone Else
With on-demand help and instant feedback from the learning system

32. So… The teacher can focus time and effort where it matters most
Not on grading
But on working with a struggling student or group of students to understand why they are struggling
Helping every student to succeed!

33. EdX MOOC “Big Data and Education” Next iteration starts June 19
Learn More
twitter.com/BakerEDMLab
Baker EDM Lab
Penn Center for Learning Analytics
EdX MOOC “Big Data and Education”
Next iteration starts June 19
All lab publications available online – Google “Ryan Baker”