Collaborative Learning Theory and Analytics

While much work in learning analytics focuses on understanding and supporting the individual learner, a great deal of learning activity happens in groups, offering opportunities to generate insight into joint learning practices. How learners interact with each other in support of learning has been a topic of rich theorization for some time, from early work on face-to-face cooperation to more recent attention focused on computer-supported collaborative learning (CSCL). This chapter unpacks four different relationships between collaborative learning theory and learning analytics (Application, Testing/Refinement, Generation, and Implementation) by examining work related to theories of joint attention, online listening, and knowledge building. Considering the relationship between theory and analytics as mediated by elements of technology, pedagogy, epistemology, and data, the chapter offers guidance for selecting relevant collaborative learning theory for particular analytic uses and overviews central issues to be considered in such use (e.g. group versus individual units of analysis, leveraging constructs and/or process models, inclusion of temporality, appropriate audiences to interpret and act on analytic outputs).