Tobias Alexander Bang Tretow-Fish: Evaluating an Adaptive Learning System through a Data Science Approach
More and more of our education today is mediated through some sort of technology. Whether by receiving updates from a teacher via mail, doing homework on a learning platform, or attending lectures in a video call from home. Tons of various hardware and software supports this transition of education moving to a digital environment but alongside this development a question occurs, how do we evaluate learning in this new environment? Variables such as students’ previous academic performance, students’ expectations towards the learning platform, how teachers use the learning platform for teaching, and the platform itself are some of the variables that affect the quality of education.
The project will establish a baseline that will act as a framework for an evaluation concept. This will be done by following a design-based research methodology. Through iterations variables are identified and their significances are evaluated through statistical and comparative analysis. The comparative analysis will compare the statistically identified variables with demographic data, literature, as well as externally collected quantitative and qualitative data. This is done to qualify the identified variables for a baseline that gives an indication to their significant regarding impact on learning outcome, retention, competence development, and platform usability. These variables will then be tested in another iteration where a cohort setup tests the hypothesized variables.
Currently there does not exist an evaluation methodology that encompasses these mentioned quality dimensions of both students’ learning, teachers’ teaching activities, content, and interactions, the learning platform, as well as employers’ evaluation of students. This is the challenge that this Ph.D. seeks to meet, by developing such an evaluation methodology as a tool to improve nursing education quality when integrating adaptive learning technologies. This is done by examining the implementation of the adaptive learning platform RhapsodeTM on the nursing education at University College Absalon.