Technology: Servant or Master of the Online Teacher?

published or submitted for publicatio

Adaptive Learning: A Tale of Two Contexts

This paper presents the results of student reactions to adaptive learning at two universities with considerably different contexts: a large public institution and a for-profit, professional university. A student response protocol developed by and administered at the University of Central Florida (UCF) was also distributed to students at Colorado Technical University (CTU). Demographic comparisons of the two responding sample groups indicated considerable differences in student characteristics, especially with respect to age and work status. However, a factor invariance comparison revealed that students at both universities evaluated the adaptive climate similarly though the lens of learning environment, guidance path and progression. When the factor scores for the institutions were compared, CTU students responded more favorably to the guidance component of adaptive learning while UCF students perceived that the adaptive learning system provided a more effective learning environment. Students who were clustered by whether or not they would reengage with adaptive courses, showed a positive and somewhat more ambivalent group. The authors concluded that adaptive learning with its flexibility and variable time component is a possible solution to the scarcity problem in our educational system, addressing students with too many needs and too few resources. The authors contend that adaptive learning could help to level the educational and economic playing fields in our society

Adaptive Analytics: It’s About Time

This article describes a cooperative research partnership among a large public university, a for-profit private institution and their common adaptive learning platform provider. The focus of this work explored adaptive analytics that uses data the investigators describe as metaphorical “digital learning dust” produced by the platform as a matter of course. The information configured itself into acquired knowledge, growth, baseline status and engagement. Two complimentary models evolved. The first, in the public university, captured end-of-course data for predicting success. The second approach, in the private university, formed the basis of a dynamic real-time data analytic algorithm. In both cases the variables that best predicted students at risk (effective use of time and revision attempts) were deemed teachable skills that can improve with intervention

iSkills/SAILS Correlation Study

This study describes the results of a correlation study between iSkills and SAILS, two information literacy assessment instruments

Technical Report: Results From the Study: Student Use of Digital Learning Materials: implications for the NSDL

Summary of results of study into how students use and learn from digital learning resources and collections of learning resourcesNational Science Foundation Grant DUE 1049537Ope

How Students Navigate, Use & Learn From Digital Resources

Poster at Educause Annual Conference 2013 on a study exploring how students use digital learning resourcesNational Science Foundation Grant DUE 1049537Ope

Survey on Student Use of Digital Resources & Learning

Survey instrument to assess student use of digital resourcesNational Science Foundation grant DUE 1059537Ope