Navigate: LMS Reporting 3.1.4

3.1.4 LMS Reporting

The grading options available in Canvas offer students and teachers to ability to exercise different skill sets that can be measure in different ways.  Canvas has an auto grade function for tests that are multiple choice, true/false, or fill in.  These types of tests give students immediate feedback, which is useful in the learning process.  Short answer or essay questions are also available, although they need to be graded by the instructor.  Sample answers can be provided so that students can get an idea of how they might have scored on their own answers.

In one of my Practice Quizzes, I offer a Formative Assessment that gives students the opportunity to view their score immediately and to use the missed questions as markers for their achievement:

Another form of assessment is in the use of rubrics.  A unique feature is the ability of teachers to add learning outcomes to the rubrics.  This is a great method as it helps engage the learner to be more in charge of their learning.  There are alerts that can be set for mastery levels - I set them to alert me whenever a student scores less than 80%.  Also, for a free platform, Canvas sure has some premium features- like analytics that show page views, which are more helpful at indicating student participation than just the time counter- which is also available.

Instructors can also grade the discussion posts and ensuing discussions.  In my experience, when an instructor is present in the online class and involved in the discussions, (whether synchronous or asynchronous) students are more engaged in the learning process as well as more trusting of the instructor.  Alerts are important to me in order to know which students need additional support.

At the student level, the reports inform the instructor of the student progress.  Whether it be quiz or test scores, pre-assessments, or page visit counts, any data on student activity is helpful to the teacher.
At the teacher level, I often check the average and standard deviation of the tests my students take.  This helps to inform my next instructional step- be it reinforcement, remediation, or a relentless push forward into new material.

For course level reporting, I use grades on the assessments and page visits for my online games to gauge which seem to be most useful and/or effective.  Even visits to the calendar can be used to inform instructions. In recent years, the number of visits to a vocabulary practice page has dropped significantly.  I think that the drop was due to the rise of quizlet.com and other practice technologies.  My next step was to create more games that are not as easily replicated on other websites.

Course level data can be used by teachers and administration to determine the effectiveness of the teacher as well as the readiness of the students.  Trends towards the increase in the number of failing students should indicate a need for closer review of the course or the implementation.