2nd International Workshop on Teaching Analytics (IWTA-2013)

 at LAK2013 – Third Conference on Learning Analytics and Knowledge

9 April 2013, Leuven, Belgium

Description

The core problem that this workshop series on “Teaching Analytics” addresses is that in comparison with most other professionals that take rapid decisions in a dynamically changing environment, presently teachers often do not get the information they need for decision making in a timely fashion and in a meaningful and actionable format. Teaching Analytics is conceived as a subfield of learning analytics that focuses on the design, development, evaluation, and education of visual analytics methods and tools for teachers in primary, secondary, and tertiary educational settings.  Teachers’ professional practices with visual analytics methods and tools are a central concern of teaching analytics. Teaching analytics methods and tools aim to develop innovative solutions to assist and augment teachers’ dynamic diagnostic decision-making in the classrooms of the 21^st century. An example usage scenario (but not limited to) is the use of teaching analytics methods and tools in high-performance classrooms that are characterized by 1:1 computing, high cognitive density, and big data.

Building on the NEXT-TELL project and the first international workshop on teaching analytics (TAPTA-2012) held at EC-TEL 2012 (http://www.next-tell.eu/tapta/), the current workshop (IWTA-2013) explores methods and tools to support teachers’ professional vision in classrooms. This workshop’s ambitious objective is to jumpstart a new learning analytics research stream on teaching analytics by bringing together learning scientists in different sub-fields such as CSCL, ITS, EDM, researchers in Visual Analytics, and data scientists working with “Big Data” in public institutions and private enterprises. In addition to researchers, we are also targeting teachers at primary, secondary, and tertiary levels of education to be involved as co-designers and discussants.

As mentioned earlier, the first workshop on teaching analytics (TAPTA-2012, http://www.next-tell.eu/tapta/), was held at EC-TEL 2012. The workshop participants included researchers as well as teachers. Topics presented and discussed at the first workshop included semiology for teaching analytics, multi-domain perspective on data collection and analysis, ontological engineering and scripting applications, open learner models, browser-based learning management system extensions, and investigation tools for teacher training. Teachers from the Strömstad Gymnasium, Sweden were invited to present their observations and reflections on the pedagogical practices in their 1:1 laptop school. Workshop proceedings are available at http://ceur-ws.org/Vol-894/.

The key lessons learnt from the first workshop were the need to further focus the workshop on teachers’ current pedagogical and analytical practices, expand the scope to include real-time teaching scenarios in the actual classroom, and explicitly emphasize the use of visual analytics for technology enhanced formative assessment. Based on the above, we invite researchers and teachers to participate in the IWTA-2013. Workshop submissions can be in the form of position papers, tool demonstrations, conceptual sketches, and/or thought experiments.

Please note workshop submissions should be concerned with teachers’ use of visual analytics methods and tools in some shape or form. No requirements are placed on contexts such as high-performance classrooms or big data volumes or real-time decision-making.

Topics

IWTA-2013 workshop topics include but are not limited to the following:

• Historical and contemporary practices in notations, representations, and  visualizations of classroom activities and student learning
• Theories and methods for designing and evaluating new notations, representations, and visualizations for teaching analytics
• Cognitive dimensions of notations for learning and teaching purposes
• Visual analytics for activity tracking
• Visual analytics for knowledge tracking
• Visual analytics for formative vs. summative evaluations
• Visual analytics for technology enhanced formative assessment
• Engendering  teachers’ professional vision in high-performance classrooms
• Synthesis of visual analytics oriented theory and practice in the Learning Sciences, e-Learning, Computer Supported Collaborative Learning (CSCL), Intelligent Tutoring Systems (ITS), Educational Data Mining, and Learning Analytics.
• Technical architectures and technological infrastructure for teaching analytics
• Linked Data for teaching analytics
• Instrumentation of classrooms and ecosystems for learning and teaching
• Critical perspectives on teaching analytics

Selection Process

4-6 page position papers/1-2 page tool demonstration/1-page conceptual sketches/1-paragraph thought experiments will be sought through a Call for Papers distributed widely. We will constitute a Program Committee and assign two reviewers to each submission (at least one PC members and one other submitting author).

• Submission deadline: 22 February 2013
• Notification of acceptance: 01 March 2013
• Camera-ready version of accepted papers: 22 March 2013
• Workshop date: Tuesday, 09 April 2013

Submissions should be made by e-mail to iwta@next-tell.eu

Dissemination

The proceedings will be published online in the CEUR series of workshop proceedings. If there is enough interest, we will pursue a journal special issue or an edited book.

Organisers

• Ravi Vatrapu, Copenhagen Business School, Denmark
• Peter Reimann, University of Sydney, Australia
• Wolfgang Halb, Joanneum Research, Austria
• Susan Bull, University of Birmingham, UK