{"id":290,"date":"2015-11-10T17:37:08","date_gmt":"2015-11-11T00:37:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.ubc.ca\/lava\/?page_id=290"},"modified":"2015-11-10T17:37:08","modified_gmt":"2015-11-11T00:37:08","slug":"lava-hackathon-2015-students-crack-data-at-learning-analytics-hackathon","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/blogs.ubc.ca\/lava\/lava-hackathon-2015-students-crack-data-at-learning-analytics-hackathon\/","title":{"rendered":"LAVA Hackathon 2015: Students Crack Data at Learning Analytics Hackathon"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>The following article in original form is available on UBC&#8217;s CTLT website at:\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/ctlt.ubc.ca\/2015\/11\/10\/students-crack-data-at-learning-analytics-hackathon\/\" target=\"_blank\">http:\/\/ctlt.ubc.ca\/2015\/11\/10\/students-crack-data-at-learning-analytics-hackathon\/<\/a><\/p>\n<hr \/>\n<p class=\"post-byline\"><em>By <a title=\"Posts by Emi Sasagawa\" href=\"http:\/\/ctlt.ubc.ca\/author\/emi-sasagawa\/\">Emi Sasagawa<\/a> on November 10, 2015<\/em><\/p>\n<p>In October 2015 the <a href=\"https:\/\/blogs.ubc.ca\/lava\/about-lava\/\">Learning Analytics Visual Analytics<\/a> (LAVA) group held the first ever learning analytics hackathon at UBC. During the two-day event, more than 70 participants with a wide range of backgrounds and expertise applied a variety of approaches to analyzing learning-related data. Some used classroom observation data to better understand how learning unfolds, while others used data from a learning management system to identify patterns in how learners use available materials.<\/p>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" width=\"840\" height=\"473\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/DJwPZJ0Rpq0?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>According to Leah Macfadyen, program director of <a href=\"http:\/\/isit.arts.ubc.ca\/learning-analytics-and-data-evaluation\/\">Evaluation and Learning Analytics<\/a> at the Faculty of Arts, the idea for the hackathon came about in one of the group\u2019s weekly meetings, after a member brought in a large data set and asked for help. The group had a lot of fun tossing around ideas about how to analyze the data and how to best present the results. The outcome was so successful that the group wondered, \u201cWhy not make it bigger? Why not have a hackathon?\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Macfadyen and other event organizers were pleasantly surprised with the large turnout. \u201cPeople are interested in doing this?\u201d asked Megan Barker, a Science Teaching and Learning Post-Doctoral Fellow with the Carl Wieman Science Education Initiative and data presenter at the hackathon. \u201cWe had no idea. We thought maybe a couple of people would find this interesting. Then all of the sudden our registration was full and we had people on the waitlist.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The event began with five researchers from across UBC pitching learning data sets to participants. Each data set captured a different aspect of learning, for example, student interactions with video content and moment-by-moment actions in a virtual physics lab. Data presenters then challenged participants to find the story behind the data.<\/p>\n<p>The hackathon attracted undergraduate and graduate students as well as faculty, staff and professionals. Participants formed groups depending on which of the five data sets they chose to work on as well as their disciplinary area of expertise and preferred analytics approach. \u201cWe wanted to bring together people who were interested in working with data. If they didn\u2019t have the same background it\u2019d be even better. They could learn from each other,\u201d said Macfadyen.<\/p>\n<figure id=\"attachment_283\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-283\" style=\"width: 300px\" class=\"wp-caption alignleft\"><a href=\"https:\/\/blogs.ubc.ca\/lava\/files\/2015\/11\/IMG_4903-2.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-283\" src=\"https:\/\/blogs.ubc.ca\/lava\/files\/2015\/11\/IMG_4903-2-300x200.jpg\" alt=\"\u201cThe hackathon was really useful to keep myself sharp and experience different data sets,\u201d said Tyler Robb-Smith (right), one of the event\u2019s participants.\" width=\"300\" height=\"200\" srcset=\"https:\/\/blogs.ubc.ca\/lava\/files\/2015\/11\/IMG_4903-2-300x200.jpg 300w, https:\/\/blogs.ubc.ca\/lava\/files\/2015\/11\/IMG_4903-2-1024x683.jpg 1024w, https:\/\/blogs.ubc.ca\/lava\/files\/2015\/11\/IMG_4903-2-1200x800.jpg 1200w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 300px) 85vw, 300px\" \/><\/a><figcaption id=\"caption-attachment-283\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">\u201cThe hackathon was really useful to keep myself sharp and experience different data sets,\u201d said Tyler Robb-Smith (right), one of the event\u2019s participants.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>Tyler Robb-Smith is a student at the British Columbia Institute of Technology and has a background in Nanohydrodynamics. He came to the event to meet people and build on his data analysis skills. \u201cIt\u2019s interesting looking at different perspectives. It\u2019s interesting how everyone has an area of expertise, and added together it made [the process] quite easy,\u201d he said. \u201cYou are able to go a lot further in a project that individually would take you a lot longer.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The event was an opportunity for like-minded people to meet and share their passion for data analysis as well as learn about LAVA. The group started with Macfadyen and a few students who were interested in working with learning research data, but it quickly grew. It wasn\u2019t long before other faculty and staff started asking to join the weekly meetings.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cA lot of people didn\u2019t know then and still don\u2019t know that this type of research actually exists at UBC. Learning analytics is a new field,\u201d said Macfadyen. According to her, the university already has a lot of learning and teaching data available, for example, from student registration systems and course evaluation systems. \u201cThese goldmines of potential insight are just sitting around and they could and should be used to inform decisions about planning throughout departments,\u201d she added.<\/p>\n<p>That\u2019s why the event was also aimed at raising the profile and visibility of this emerging field and showing what can come out of this type of analysis. Learning research data can tell instructors about what the most effective teaching methods are and how they\u2019re working in their classrooms. It can inform departments about why certain classes are more popular than others. It can help instructors plan for courses.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe really wanted to raise awareness about how data can be used to improve teaching and learning practices,\u201d said Ido Roll, senior manager for Research and Evaluation in the Centre for Teaching, Learning, and Technology and one of the event\u2019s organizers. \u201cThe hackathon was a great way to combine interesting questions about how people learn, large data sets and a group of eager and motivated experts.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>This year\u2019s event was a success. At the end of the hackathon nine participant-led groups presented their research findings. Several of these projects have become full-scale research projects following the event. According to Roll and Macfadyen, the most common question from participants was how soon would there be another hackathon.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The following article in original form is available on UBC&#8217;s CTLT website at:\u00a0http:\/\/ctlt.ubc.ca\/2015\/11\/10\/students-crack-data-at-learning-analytics-hackathon\/ By Emi Sasagawa on November 10, 2015 In October 2015 the Learning Analytics Visual Analytics (LAVA) group held the first ever learning analytics hackathon at UBC. During the two-day event, more than 70 participants with a wide range of backgrounds and expertise &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/blogs.ubc.ca\/lava\/lava-hackathon-2015-students-crack-data-at-learning-analytics-hackathon\/\" class=\"more-link\">Continue reading<span class=\"screen-reader-text\"> &#8220;LAVA Hackathon 2015: Students Crack Data at Learning Analytics Hackathon&#8221;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":392,"featured_media":0,"parent":0,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-290","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ubc.ca\/lava\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/290","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ubc.ca\/lava\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ubc.ca\/lava\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ubc.ca\/lava\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/392"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ubc.ca\/lava\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=290"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ubc.ca\/lava\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/290\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":292,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ubc.ca\/lava\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/290\/revisions\/292"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ubc.ca\/lava\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=290"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}