Overview
What is MyLA?
Note: This tool has been implemented as part of a UFIT pilot study. My Learning Analytics (MyLA) is a tool, developed by the University of Michigan and hosted by Unizin, to empower students to improve their own academic outcomes through a better understanding of their online course performance and progress. The visualizations allow students to set learning goals and to monitor progression towards those goals as well as view their activities and performance relative to their peers. For this pilot, instructors can opt-in to activating one or more of the three visualizations (all within the My Learning Analytics tab that can be added to the left-hand Canvas navigation) as they fit in with their course design:
Student Testimonials:
See what students have said about their experience using MyLA:
- “This was super helpful when it came to exam times. I could see how my classmates were studying and what resources they were using, and that helped me try to figure out my own gameplan.”
- “It really helped plan out my studying goals—I knew how much each assignment counted for in my grade, so I could set priorities.”
- “I thought it was useful to gain insight to how I was doing overall in comparison to other students in the class.”
Further Information for Instructors and Students
For more information on how to use MyLA please see the specific sections for instructors and students.
Research and Data Privacy
To help protect student privacy, the Grade Distribution visualization does have binning on low outliers. Neither the Grade Distribution or Resources Accessed visualizations should be enabled by the instructor when there are less than 11 students in a course.
Additionally, individual student views are only available to the student (i.e., an instructor does not have access to a specific student’s Resources Accessed visualization). An aggregated and de-identified report can be requested by instructors after the term to inform future course design decisions. Data for research purposes would require IRB approval. For further information and assistance, please contact the UFIT Center for Instructional Technology and Training.
Data Reports can include the following:
- Number of courses with MyLA enabled (per term)
- Total unique users (and by course)
- Number and percentage of course users opening Resources Accessed, Assignment Planning, Grade Distribution visualizations
- Number and percentage of course users making changes to default settings in Resources Accessed, Assignment Planning, and Grade Distribution visualizations
- Default settings changes and selections
Pilot Study
In an effort to achieve UFIT’s 2020-2025 strategic goals of advancing an analytics-enabled environment and enabling student success, MyLA was implemented as a pilot study in 2022 (IRB study #202102061). We are currently collaborating with other Unizin member institutions and will provide updates periodically on our research findings. If you would like to participate in this work, provide informal feedback, or learn more, please contact Dr. Heather Maness.
Please know your participation in this activity is voluntary. We believe there are no risks to you for participating in this study. There is also no direct compensation to you for participating. If you have questions about your rights, contact the UF IRB office, PO Box 100173, University of Florida, Gainesville, FL 32611 and reference #202102061.
Fall 2022 Update
Over 3,000 students in 20 courses had the opportunity to try MyLA. About a third of them used the tool (similar to UMich) and most accessed it several times throughout the semester (>8k sessions). The majority of student respondents in our survey (64-71%) found the data helpful for planning their course activity, studying, and improving their confidence that they understood the material. They also hoped it would become available in more courses (85%). A quarter of the students experienced technical issues so, over the next year, we will work to host it on a more stable platform. We will also continue to collaborate with UMich to enhance the utility of the visualizations, such as by adding Mediasite analytics. Most students who did not use MyLA noted that they did not know it was available or forgot about it. This highlights the need to provide more instructor communication about supplemental learning tools, beyond 2 announcements and a video posted with other lecture content.
Acknowledgements
We would like to thank the University of Michigan for developing the system and documentation as well as for sharing their work with us. My Learning Analytics is hosted by Unizin and depends on the Unizin Data Platform and the Unizin Data Warehouse. MyLA is offered as a service for Unizin member institutions.