Learning Analytics and how to use in educational or serious games for improving the use of the games game traces evidence based education Talk at the Ecole Normal Superior, Lyon, France

1. Applying Learning Analytics
in Serious Games
Baltasar Fernandez-Manjon
e-UCM research group, www.e-ucm.es
balta@fdi.ucm.es
@BaltaFM
École Normale Supérieure de Lyon, Novembre 2014
http://www.slideshare.net/BaltasarFernandezManjon/

2. About me and context
• CS Professor at Complutense University
• Director of e-UCM
• e-UCM research group about
Learning technologies
• 15 researchers
• Serious games
• Development of technology
• eAdventure, GLEANER
• Application to the medical domain
• European projects
• H2020 – RAGE (call 21)
• SEGAN
• www.e-ucm.es
RAGE -H2020
2

3. Educational games in the classroom: game
• The Radix Endeavor
• https://www.radixendeavor.org
• MMOG with Science,
Technology, Engeneering and
Math (STEM) topics
• Many different quests
• Adapted to middle and high
school curriculum
• Facilities for teachers
• Class configuration
• Quest assignation
• Now being tested in actual
settings

4. Educational games in the classroom: settings
• Master students in the e-learning
class
• 13 students, 8 nationalities
• No previous info about the game
• If stuck ask for help or watch the
help videos
• One hour free play
• Who perform “better” at 30
minutes and at the end
• Publish screen captures in the
class Moodle course forum

5. Educational games in the classroom: outcome
• Students were really engaged for the whole hour
• They enjoyed the experience
• Consider the game a commercial quality game
• No one asked for help
• All of them published the screenshots in the Moodle class forum
• Educational outcome
• Only 4 of the students complete more than 2 quests
• Most of the students just spend the time exploring the environment but not
doing anything “useful” or learning anything
• Actual data can be contradictory with simple observation

6. Learning Analytics
• Improving education based on
data analysis
• Data driven
• Evidence-based education
• Educational theories/approaches
can be contrasted with actual
data
• Related with …
• Educational data mining
• Business intelligence
• Visual analytics
www.ed.gov/edblogs/technology/files/2012/03/edm-la-brief.pdf 6

7. Learning analytics steps
• 1. Collecting large amounts of data from a number of channels
• Interaction with the system
• 2. Translating that data into information or actionable insights.
• It may be impossible to track how much a student really absorbed from one
lesson but the system CAN track his/her behaviour and use that as a signal
• 3. Use of the information for different purposes
• Personalization and adaptation. Once the system gets the signal, it can then
personalize each student’s learning environment.
• Assessment. Use that information for formative or summative assessment
• Predicting the best course in the future. As students use the system for a
prolonged period of time, educators will be able to track what works and
what doesn’t – and adjust accordingly.
http://www.edudemic.com/grades-2-0-how-learning-analytics-are-changing-the-teachers-role/

8. The 4 Levels of Learning Analytics
• Descriptive
• What has happened?
• Diagnostic
• Why did it happen?
• Predictive
• What will happen?
• Prescriptive
• What should I do?
http://www.edudemic.com/4-levels-learning-analytics-graphic/

9. Game Analytics: a parallel world
• Application of analytics to game
development and research
• Telemetry
• Data obtained over distance
• Mobile games, MMOG
• Game metrics
• Interpretable measures of data
related to games
• Player behavior
• User metrics
• Generics metrics
• Genre specific metrics
• Game specific metrics
9

10. Uses of Learning Analytics in educational games
• Game testing – game analytics
• It is the game realiable?
• How many students finish the game?
• Average time to complete the game?
• Game evaluation
• From pre-post test to learning analytics evaluation
• Game deployment in the class
• Real-time information for supporting the teacher
• “Stealth” student evaluation
• Knowing what is happening when the game is deployed in the class

11. The Feedback loop
• Not only important the feedback but also when is provided
• Learning analytics can help in improving feedback
http://www.wired.com/2011/06/ff_feedbackloop/
http://safety.fhwa.dot.gov/speedmgt/ref_mats/fhwasa12004/

12. Use of the educational games: Black box model
• Games as independent pieces of
content
• No information about what is
happening during the in-game
play
• Or very simple
• Completed or not completed
• Time used
12
del Blanco et al (2013). Using e-Learning standards in educational video games.
Computer Standards & Interfaces 36 (1) pp. 178–187

13. Designing for Learning Analytics in Games
• Educational games need to be designed for Learning Analytics
• Games make use of in game mechanisms for the assessment of player
performance and progress
• Interrelate observable in game behaviors to a competency based
model related with learning outcomes rather than game performance
• What are the relevant educational situations that want to be identified?
• Do we have the way to communicate the game state?
• Varibles, flags, identifiers
Implications of Learning Analytics for Serious Game Design. Jannicke Baalsrud Hauge, Riccardo Berta, Giusy Fiucci,
Baltasar Fernandez Manjon, Carmen Padron-Napoles, Wim Westera and Rob Nadolski. IEEE ICALT 2014

14. Use of educational/serious games at the school
Takeuchi, L. M., & Vaala, S. (2014). Level up learning: A national survey on teaching with digital games. New York: The Joan Ganz Cooney Center at Sesame Workshop

15. Use of games at the school

16. Our work in Serious/Educational
Games

17. eAdventure game platform
Open code authoring environment for the production of point-and-click
adventure games & immersive learning simulations
Easy to include Learning
Analytics in eAdventure
games
http://sourceforge.net/projects/e-adventure/

18. http://first-aid-game.e-ucm.es With MGH-Harvard University
http://www.chermug.eu
With ONT, educ@ONT

19. eAdventure + Learning Analytics
Communication
API
Game Engine
{
type: 'input',
timeStamp: some_timestamp,
device: 'some_device',
action: 'some_action',
target: 'target_id',
data: { key1: value, ...}
}
{
type: 'logic',
timeStamp: some_timestamp,
event: 'some_event',
target: 'some_id',
data: { key1: value, ...}
}
Learning Analytics
Database

20. GLEANER
• GLEANER: Game Learning Analytics for education research
• Open code framework to capture game traces
20
Reference model in the EU NoE GALA, http://e-ucm.github.io/gleaner/
Ángel Serrano-Laguna, Javier Torrente, Pablo Moreno-Ger, Baltasar Fernández-Manjón (2014): Application of
Learning Analytics in Educational Videogames. Entertainment Computing, Elsevier (in press, early access available).

21. GLEANER Architecture

22. GLEANER Architecture - Technologies

23. GLEANER Analysis
• Reporter has access to the database, and presents its data through reports
• graphics, heat-maps, relational tables…
• Evaluator has access to the database and checks the educational defined goals
in the assessment model

24. ADL eXperience API (xAPI)
‣ Result of Project Tin Can
‣ Tracks experiences, informal learning, real-world
experiences (not just completions)
‣ Allows data storage AND retrieval (ex. 3rd party reporting
and analytics tools)
‣ Enables tracking mobile, games, ITS, and virtual worlds
experiences
‣ Developed by open source community
24 From Damon Regan (ADL) presentation at SINTICE2013

25. 25
Activity Streams
• http://activitystrea.ms
• Collaboration between Google, Facebook, Microsoft and others
• Allows reporting of experiences, not just completions
• Format: <Actor> <Verb> <Object> (I did this):
Simple Statement:
I (actor) watched (verb) a video on protecting employee data (object)
Complex:
in the context of [information assurance certification training] with result
[timestamp:2013-0618T18:30:32.360Z ].
From Damon Regan (ADL) presentation at SINTICE2013

26. Reporting
Systems
Assessme
nt Services
Semantic
Analysis
Statistical
Services
xAPI Learning Record Store (LRS)
26 From Damon Regan (ADL) presentation at SINTICE2013

27. GLEANER traces and xAPI

28. Example: A game to learn XML
http://gleaner.e-ucm.es/lostinspace/play/index.html

29. About the game...
• A basic platform game to acquire familiarity with XML documents
• Learn the syntax
• Understand nesting and attributes
• Gain agility writing and reading XML documents
• Designed as a complementary activity in a Web Programming Course
• For undergraduate computer science students
• Not developed with eAdventure

30. Understanding the game…
Main character
Goal
Write XML snippets here
to move the main
character to the goal
Power-ups
(new syntax elements)

31. Educational goals
• Basic understanding of XML Syntax
• Markup syntax
• Basic documents
• Attributes
• Complex documents
• Basic programing skills
• Sequencing
• Loops

32. LA perspective
• What does GLEANER trace?
• Higher level events
• Generic traces & game specific traces
• Only those relevant for our learning objectives
• The aggregator will filter and transmit:
• Level completion events
• Each XML fragment submitted by the player

33. Main dashboard (GLEANER Report)
33

34. Progress report
34
User
Session
Phases
completed
Current
score
Learning achievements
Achievements are
updated and
highlighted in real time

35. Detailed traces
35
Filters XML snipets
The fragments are updated in real time as submitted by
the student. The instructor can filter to see only mistakes,
or all the fragments submitted by a specific students.

36. LA simplify SG deployment in the classroom
• Experiment: Gamified experience in the classroom
Goals
• First to complete the game
• Maximum points in the game
but
• Initially students were not informed that LA was in place
After some playing time LA data was showed to the students
‣ Instructor knows what is happening in the class
‣ Behavior change when students know that LA was in place
• More oriented to success and less exploration or “playing”
Ángel Serrano-Laguna, Baltasar Fernández-Manjón (2014): Applying learning analytics to simplify serious games deployment in the
classroom. Proceedings of the 2014 IEEE Global Engineering Education Conference (EDUCON) Pages 872-877.

37. Experimental design and Learning Analytics
• Learning Analytics should be in-line with the experimental design
• Annonymization
• Use of the data
• Specific regulations in several domains
• Medical: ethics committees

38. La Dama Boba : Educational game for promoting
students interest in classical theater
Based on The Foolish Lady by Lope de Vega
The game is available at http://damaboba.e-ucm.es/ (in Spanish)
Also in in Android Market

39. Experiment game vs class
• Teacher with an improved
standard content
• 757 students
• From 8 middle and high schools
in Madrid region
• Control group and experimental
group

40. Formal evaluation pre-post
• Off-line learning analytics
• Formal evaluation of games is
very complex and expensive
• Pre-test
• Post-test
• Very few games have been
formally probed to be effective
• Similar results with Learning
Analytics than with pre-post
test?
40

41. learning analytics outcomes: scores, time, ...

42. How the user play the game?
42

43. Open issues in learning analytics in games
• How to distinguish automatically game exploration from conceptual
errors?
• Traces across different types of games
• Long term learning across games

44. Other important issues in LA
• Ethical and legal aspects
• Security model
• Ownership of information
• Informing the user
• Anonymization of information
• Aspects specially relevant if you are working with kids or in the medical
domain!
44

45. Conclusions
• LA in Serious Games has a great potential from the application and research
perspective
• Ease the deplyment of game in the classroom
• Simplify game evaluation with users
• LA in Serious Games should benefits from Games Analytics experience and
work
• Still complex to implement LA in SG
• Increases the (already high) cost of the games
• Frameworks and new standards specifications could greatly simplify LA
implementation and adoption
45

46. Thank you!
46
balta@fdi.ucm.es
@BaltaFM

47. Our current projects
RAGE
H2020 ICT2014-21ª
Realising an Applied Gaming Eco-system