At the end of 2019, Canvas rolled out New Analytics, a new version of their former analytics tool, Course Analytics. By Canvas' own description, New Analytics retains the core functionality of Course Analytics while offering a simplified user experience. In this post we share our recommendations for leveraging New Analytics to support students.
Introduction to New Analytics
The New Analytics landing page, which is titled Course Grades, contains an interactive scatterplot display, with points on the graph representing class averages on different assignments. Instructors can hover over different points to see what assignments they represent and click into them to see information about low and high grades. They can also type individual students' names into the search bar at the top of the page to compare a student's grades to the class average, and filter the scatterplot by assignment type (namely, assignments, discussions, and quizzes).
Within New Analytics instructors will also find tabs for Weekly Online Activity, Students, Reports, and Online Attendance. Find below short summaries of the information that is available to instructors by tab:
- In Weekly Online Activity, line graphs show average page views and participations per week for the course. Clicking on a data point shows which students were active and (to a limited extent) what they were doing each week. Below the graphs there is a table called Resources with additional information.
- The Students tab lists all students in the course. Here also instructors can find information about students' page views and participations. Clicking on a student’s name will bring up a version of the homepage that is specific to that student and a communication chart: a bar graph providing information about the student in question's Canvas communications.
- The Reports tab provides information about missing, late, and excused assignments. To preview a report, instructors can click the ‘i’ next to the report name. Depending on account settings, the Class Roster Report may contain the email addresses associated with student Canvas accounts. This can be helpful for instructors if they are hoping to message their class after a given course concludes.
- If there are account-level attendance criteria, the Online Attendance tab will show which students have/have not met those criteria. Please note that the Online Attendance tab has to be enabled and configured by an administrator, and may not be visible in all instances of Canvas.
For a visual introduction to New Analytics, see the Canvas New Analytics Overview Video. For answers to common New Analytics questions (including technical questions like what constitutes a page view or participation), see New Analytics FAQ and Analytics Page Views and Participations.
Leveraging New Analytics
By design, New Analytics gives instructors the freedom to manipulate their data in different ways to identify data points and trends that are maximally useful to them. Find below a handful of strategies we recommend for supporting student success and gaining insight into course design and learning, accompanied by relevant Canvas Community Guides.
For more general information on LMS analytics, see the companion Envision article LMS Analytics: Supporting Your Students With Data.
Student Success
- Use the guide on the course average data table to compare an individual student to the class average. This can help you identify students in need of additional scaffolding or support.
- Use the guide on individual student analytics (and specifically, the section on the Weekly Online Activity Graph) to confirm that a student (perhaps, a student whose performance has declined or a student who has missed a few assignments) is active in the course. If you find that a student is not active in a course, you may wish to send them a message or, depending on your program, to reach out to their student success coordinator or advisor.
- To message students directly from the New Analytics platform, see this guide on the Message Students Who function. Messaging students is especially useful 3-4 weeks into a standard term. This is long enough for instructors to identify a pattern of student behavior/work, but it also gives students sufficient time to course correct.
Course Design and Learning
- Use the guide on weekly online activity analytics to ensure that students are engaging with course content. The line graph on this page displays average page views and participations by week, providing a window into student engagement high, and raising provocative questions about the content students find most (and least!) engaging.
- Use the guide on average course grade analytics to identify assignments that are too easy or too hard. If you identify an outlier assignment, you may wish to revise it or provide additional scaffolding/support for it before your course runs again.