Interpreting Learner Interaction in LMS to draw meaningful insights for e-Learning strategy

L&D Managers often question themselves on how can they get more insights about the learners and provide content accordingly. The real challenge comes when they have a heterogeneous group of learners consisting of a few geniuses, mostly average and a few below average learners!

The use of technology in learning, especially through an LMS, has provided a powerful tool in hands of the Learning & Development managers through which they can deliver different courses to learners based on their learning profiles.

Astute L&D Managers can dexterously use the reporting capabilities of Learning Management System to draw meaningful insights about the learners. These insights can direct their Learning & Development initiatives to achieve the desired results for the organization, thus providing an edge over the competition.

Continuing G-Cube’s research on this challenge, I came across an insightful research paper by Onur Donmez titled “How can we make use of learner interaction in Online learning environments?” This paper truly hits the nail on the head. There are two interesting examples in this paper which shows creative use of an LMS to draw meaningful conclusions about the learners and the e-Learning content.

Experiment 1

In this experiment, 27 students of a mathematics course were selected and trained using e-Learning tools. The key highlights were:

• The course was instructor-led, with traditional classroom approach as well as e-learning support.
• The e-learning module was suitably enriched with activity based interactions like quizzes and questionnaires.
• User interaction within the online forum and content usage was also monitored using the LMS.

The researchers with help of the data collected using the Learning Management System’s found that that the learner group interacted a lot with the course. They concluded that the group will benefit from an e-Learning content which is highly interactive and immersive.

Experiment 2

In the second experiment, researchers tried to find the problem solving capabilities of a learner group using technology. A group of software-programming students were presented with programming instructions and asked to write a specific code to create model of a ‘house’:

• If the written code was wrong, the program warned the students of the error. If the code was correct, the program animated the line for a second as a feedback to the student.
• To provide insight to the researchers, the program also collected data. It saved written codes in every run attempt, providing insight into the problem solving capabilities of the student.

At the end of this exercise, studying learner-interactions gave useful insight into each student. It also equipped the researchers to invaluable knowledge in developing suitable learning material for the group, keeping each individual’s strength and weakness in mind.

LMS – Beyond managing content

The two experiments above prove that the capabilities of Learning Management technology is not limited to managing e-Learning content and delivering different kind of content to different learner groups. An LMS also provides great insights about the learners and their interaction with content. Using this, it is possible to design and deliver impactful content as per the needs of the learner.

What Next!

If you are looking to know more about how Learning Management System can deliver valuable insights about your learners please view demo of an LMS by clicking here or you may contact us to know more.