E-learn Weblog of Willem van Valkenburg

Phil Hill has written an interesting post about student patterns in MOOCs. I have written about this earlier this year. But Phil continued with this research and it is getting more interesting. Below the main figure:

He identified 5 different types of users. Earlier he used 4 types:

1. ‘No-Shows’: appear to be the largest group of those registering for an open-enrollment MOOC, where people register but never login to the course while it is active.
2. ‘Completing’: learners who completed the majority of the assessments offered in the class. Though these participants varied in how well they performed on the assessment, they all at least attempted the assignments. This engagement pattern is most similar to a student in a traditional class. ‘Passive’ participants are students who might watch videos, take quizzes, read discuss forums, but generally do not engage with the assignments and post in discussion forums. ‘Active’ participants are the students who participate in the majority of assignments and post in discussion forums.
3. ‘Auditing’: learners who did assessments infrequently if at all and engaged instead by watching video lectures. Students in this cluster followed the course for the majority of its duration. No students in this cluster obtained course credit.
4. ‘Disengaging’: learners who did assessments at the beginning of the course but then have a marked decrease in engagement (their engagement patterns look like Completing at the beginning of the course but then the student either disappears from the course entirely or sparsely watches video lectures). The moments at which the learners disengage differ, but it is generally in the first third of the class. A subcategory includes ‘Drop Outs’ who cease all course activity.
5. ‘Sampling’: learners who watched video lectures for only one or two assessment periods (generally learners in this category watch just a single video). Though many learners “sample” at the beginning of the course, there are many others that briefly explore the material when the class is already fully under way.