The Effectiveness of Learning Analytics Dashboards in Synchronous E-Learning Environments for Enhancing Students’ Engagement

The aim of this study was to investigate the effectiveness of using a learning analytics dashboard in synchronous e-learning environments on increasing student engagement in a teaching methods course. A quasi-experimental single-group design with pre-test and post-test was used for this purpose. The participants in this study included 34 students from teaching competency courses, who were selected through convenience sampling. The BigBlueButton platform, which features a learning analytics dashboard, was utilized over six sessions. The data was collected using the learning analytics tool from the BigBlueButton platform. The results indicated that using a visual learning analytics dashboard had a significant impact on the number of emojis sent, the number of times participants raised their hands, speaking time, and the number of questions answered. Although the average number of messages increased after the dashboard was displayed, this increase was not statistically significant. Therefore, dashboards can lead to an increase in learning opportunities. Based on these results, it is suggested that virtual education platforms in universities and educational centers could be equipped with simultaneous learning analytics dashboards and future researches should be developed in this field.