OnTask: A Learning Analytics Tool to Provide Personalized Feedback to Every Student

Event Date & Time

Event Description

Pillar: Transformative Learning

Giving timely, relevant feedback to students is a critical aspect of good teaching and supporting student success. With increasing class size and student diversity in many higher education institutions, personalized feedback to students can be difficult to provide due to limited time and resources available to instructors. Based on nudge theory, where the use of reinforcement and indirect suggestions can change behaviour through encouragement, Fritz (2017) claims we can use learning analytics data to help nudge students to take responsibility for their own learning.

OnTask is a Learning Analytics tool that enables instructors to give targeted, customized messages based on the metrics that they set for their courses. This allows instructors to provide students with timely and personal feedback that can scale to large courses. Feedback can range from targeted remediation suggestions for students at-risk to enrichment opportunities for high achieving students.

After a brief introduction to OnTask, three instructors currently piloting the OnTask tool in their classes will discuss their experiences with the tool, as well as its successes, failures, and potential to improve teaching and learning at UBC.

Panelists will then entertain questions from the audience about how OnTask can be used to provide feedback in their courses. Following the workshop, participants who wish to use OnTask in their teaching will receive ongoing support for implementation and evaluation by the UBC Learning Analytics team.

In this workshop, participants will:
• Learn how to use OnTask to provide personalized feedback to their students
• Hear about the experiences of three instructors from Physics, Sociology, and Land & Food Systems
• Identify key data needed to support feedback to learners in their courses
• Write supportive feedback to students based on conceptual student personas
• be prepared to use OnTask in their own teaching practice in the next academic year

Join us to learn how you Learning Analytics can help you transform the way students receive feedback in your course!

Panelists:

• Simon Bates, Professor of Teaching, Department of Physics & Astronomy, Faculty of Science | Associate-Provost, Teaching and Learning UBC
• Silvia Bartolic, Instructor, Department of Sociology, Faculty of Arts
• Sandra Brown, Instructor, Applied Biology, Faculty of Land and Food Systems

Facilitators:

• Firas Moosvi, Learning Analytics Project

UBC Okanagan Faculty:

Faculty members from UBC Okanagan are invited to join this session via Skype for Business.  Please email Heidi Wudrick at heidi.wudrick@ubc.ca for the Skype for Business conference ID.