Handbook of Learning Analytics
Chapter 16
Handbook of Learning Analytics
First Edition
Multilevel Analysis of Activity and
Actors in Heterogeneous Networked Learning
Environments
Daniel D. Suthers
Abstract
Learning in today’s networked environments is often distributed across multiple media and sites, and takes place simultaneously via multiple levels of agency and processes. This is a challenge for those wishing to study learning as embedded in social networks, or simply to monitor a networked learning environment for practical purposes. Traces of activity may be fragmented across multiple logs, and the granularity at which events are recorded may not match analytic needs. This chapter describes an analytic framework, Traces, for analyzing participant interaction in one or more digital settings by computationally deriving higher levels of description. The Traces framework includes concepts for modelling interaction in sociotechnical systems, a hierarchy of models with corresponding representations, and computational methods for translating between these levels by transforming representations. Potential applications include identifying sessions of interaction, key actors within sessions, relationships between actors, changes in participation over time, and groups or communities of learners.
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Title
Multilevel Analysis of Activity and Actors in Heterogeneous Networked Learning Environments
Book Title
Handbook of Learning Analytics
Pages
pp. 189-197
Copyright
2017
DOI
10.18608/hla17.016
ISBN
978-0-9952408-0-3
Publisher
Society for Learning Analytics Research
Authors
Daniel D. Suthers
Author Affiliations
Department of Information and Computer Sciences, University of Hawaii, USA
Editors
Charles Lang1
George Siemens2
Alyssa Wise3
Dragan Gašević4
Editor Affiliations
1. Teachers College, Columbia University, USA
2. LINK Research Lab, University of Texas at Arlington, USA
3. Learning Analytics Research Network, New York University, USA
4. Schools of Education and Informatics, University of Edinburgh, UK