The Interactive Data Exploration and Analytics (IDEA) lab course offered at the UDE Social Computing Group focuses on the effective integration of techniques from human-computer interaction (HCI), information visualization, and machine learning to help users interactively explore and visualize data.

The aim of this semester’s IDEA lab is to co-design and implement Learning Analytics indicators in CourseMapper using OpenLAP. CourseMapper is a MOOC platform developed at the UDE Social Computing Group. It aims to support collaboration and interaction around PDF and video learning materials using annotations, recommendations, and learning analytics.

Learning analytics (LA) is about collecting traces that learners leave behind and using those traces to improve learning and teaching. In LA systems, data is traditionally displayed through dashboards with indicator visualizations developed from digital traces that learners leave when they interact with different learning environments. Typical examples of LA indicators are “Total access of learning materials” and “Number of students who accessed the learning materials”

Human-Centered Learning Analytics (HCLA) is an emerging research area that places human factors at the core of LA. It integrates principles from Human-Computer Interaction (HCI) into LA to involve different stakeholders (e.g., students, teachers, researchers, and designers) throughout the LA process, from design to evaluation.

Following an HCLA approach, the Open Learning Analytics Platform (OpenLAP) developed at the UDE Social Computing Group aims to help LA stakeholders co-design and implement LA indicators using no-code environments. Specifically, the ISC Creator in OpenLAP provides an intuitive and theoretically-sound UI to help students and teachers co-design LA Indicator Specification Cards (ISCs). The Indicator Editor in OpenLAP supports users who have prior knowledge about data analysis and visualization in implementing LA indicators using real activity data collected from educational environments based on the Experience API (xAPI) data format.

The lab students will work together in groups on two main tasks:

• In the first part of the lab, you’ll get a general overview of CourseMapper and OpenLAP, get familiar with the literature on what students/teachers expect as LA indicators in online learning environments (MOOCs, Moodle, etc.), ideate and co-design possible LA indicators for CourseMapper using the OpenLAP ISC Creator and implement them using the OpenLAP Indicator Editor.
• In the second part of the lab, based on the gained experience with the ISC Creator & Indicator Editor, you’ll evaluate (in terms of usability and effectiveness), redesign, improve, and further develop the functionalities of the ISC Creator or Indicator Editor. We’ll provide a crash course on React.JS (the frontend Web technology used in the OpenLAP ISC Creator & Indicator Editor) and give tutorials on how to get started with the OpenLAP project.

There will be weekly project management meetings to answer your questions and guide you with additional materials. We will also have regular sessions where you will present the progress of your work.

Grading for this lab will be based on the content and quality of the submissions as well as your performance (project management, collaboration, class participation, creativity) during the lab.