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Background: Learning analytics (LA) collects, analyses, and reports data from the learning environment, to provide evidence of the effects of a particular learning design. Learning design (LD) outlines the conceptual framework for a meaningful interpretation of Learning analytics data. Objectives: The study aims to identify the most relevant concepts at the intersection of learning design and learning analytics, how these concepts are integrated into more general thematic areas, and the implications for the research and practice of the learning design and learning analytics synergy. Methods: To this end, the study employs a critical interpretive synthesis (CIS) of the selected papers, and complements it with elements of systematic literature review as well as qualitative content analysis and text analytics that employ machine learning and language technology. Results and conclusions: The most important themes identified are 'analytics', 'learning', 'data', 'tools', 'research', 'framework', 'informed', 'model-driven', 'participatory', 'technique', 'impact', insight', and 'findings'. The text analytics detected two topic rarely explicitly discussed in the literature: 'evidence-informed instructional design approaches' and 'design-based research'. Future research should attempt a holistic perspective towards the LD and LA synergy considering evidence-informed instructional design approaches as part of a design-based research methodology that implements evidence-based teachers' practice and research-based findings.

Internationalisation has been a key theme in higher education (HE) for decades. Multiple initiatives across the world have contributed to creating offerings of high-quality online education, with collaborations across national borders. Two of the concepts that have proved to be influential are Virtual Mobility (VM) and Open Education (OE). Virtual mobility refers to study activities that students enrolled in HE in one country undertake online in other countries without physically moving. Such activities are certified and mutually acknowledged by participating institutions. Open education covers global initiatives increasing access to free online quality education, without or with alternative forms of certification. The research presented in this article identifies the learner skills and competences that are supported by Open Virtual Mobility (OpenVM), a new trend in online education that builds upon these two concepts. A group concept mapping study based on the contributions of experts in both VM and OE resulted in defining seven learner skills and competence areas including: intercultural skills and attitudes; networked learning; active self-regulated learner skills; media and digital literacy; autonomy-driven learning, interactive and collaborative learning in an authentic international environment and open-mindedness. The study provided input for further conceptualising of OpenVM as a bridge between VM and OE.

During the COVID-19 crisis, digital informal learning is important for students' academic engagement. Although scholars have highlighted the importance of students' digital competence in improving digital informal learning (DIL), the mediating role of DIL between digital competence and academic engagement has remained ambiguous. The purpose of this study is to investigate the relationship between students' digital competence and their academic engagement with the mediating role of DIL in the higher education context. This study used a descriptive correlational design, and the data were analyzed using structural equation modelling (SEM). The study sample included 308 students from Shiraz University, Iran. The results showed that digital competence positively and significantly correlated with students' DIL and their academic engagement. Furthermore, DIL, as the mediator variable, was found to mediate the relationship between students' digital competence and their academic engagement. Since higher education institutions have a key role in improving students' academic engagement, particularly in the COVID-19 pandemic, academic administrators should pay more attention to students' digital competencies and provide them with efficient and user-friendly DIL platforms that can increase their academic engagement.

Openness in education is not a consistent term or value since "open" is used to describe various things and often means different things to different individuals. In a research context, it is important to identify the many interpretation(s) and perspectives of openness being investigated, especially since the underlying ideas behind these different interpretations and contexts can yield different results. Not much empirical research on the implementation aspects of open education exists, especially comparing open educational resources (OER) and open online education (OOE). This empirical study addresses this gap, exploring identification and prioritization of organizational challenges and opportunities of two subgroups of projects (i.e. OER focused or OOE focused) within various higher education institutions in The Netherlands. The main research question in this study is: Does the project character (OER focus vs. OOE focus) of innovation projects lead to perceived differences by actors involved in their implementation? Findings indicate that there are differences in conceptual as well as practical representation between the two groups. These findings imply that higher education institutions need to internally adapt to the needs of various manifestations of "openness" to be able to fully benefit from opportunities and overcome challenges.

Concept mapping facilitates the externalisation and internalisation of knowledge by individuals during collaborative knowledge construction. However, not much is known about the individual and collaborative learning processes during collaborative concept mapping (CCM) in interdisciplinary knowledge construction. Premised on literature on collaboration scripts to scaffold the collaboration process, this study investigates the effect of an individual preparation phase prior to collaborative work on the epistemic and social processes of knowledge co-construction, as well as the degree of interdisciplinary knowledge integration in collaborative concept mapping. A total of N = 42 third year university students were put into one of the two experimental conditions: with individual preparation phase (WIP) and without individual preparation phase (WOIP). Students worked on a collaborative assignment to integrate interdisciplinary knowledge in collaborative concept mapping. Data for analysis was derived from audio recordings of the collaborative discourse in both experimental conditions. Chi-square test was conducted to investigate if there were significant differences between the effects of WIP and WOIP on the epistemological and social dimension. Findings showed that groups in the WIP condition showed significantly more verification, clarification and positioning statements in the epistemic dimension and also significantly more integration-oriented and conflict-oriented consensus building in the social dimension as compared to groups in the WOIP condition. On the degree of interdisciplinary knowledge integration, independent sample t-tests showed that there was no significant difference for concepts, domains and cross-links between the two experimental conditions. However, there was significant difference in types of cross-links for the CCMs in the WIP condition.

In today's and tomorrow's world, people will be required to work longer. At the same time, their employment future will become increasingly insecure due to technological advances and obsolescence of acquired knowledge and skills. This means that something needs to happen in the education and training of our youth. Using a group concept mapping (GCM) procedure, experts in different fields (educators, educational researchers, human resource professionals, etc.) from primarily Europe and North America generated 239 ideas with regard to the trigger statement: "One specific way to prepare youth to make effective and efficient use of information skills to optimally function in tomorrow's labour market is . . . ." The generated ideas were sorted into 15 thematic clusters (i.e., Critical Thinking, Skills Transfer, High-Level Thinking, Competences, Metacognition and Reflection, Efficacy [Self-Image] Building, Learn in Authentic Situations, Integrate School and Profession, Collaboration, Teacher Professionalization, Information Literacy, Redesign the School, Literacy, and Numeracy, Information Skills, and Learn for the Future) and then rated with respect to their importance and ease/difficulty of implementation. The results showed a disconnect between what was important and ease of implementation with highly important clusters judged to be difficult to implement and vice versa. This led to the definition of a 3-stage approach to adapting education to prepare youth for shortly nonexistent/not yet existing professions.

This study investigated the effect of two problem-solving techniques: (a) free-association with a direct reference to the problem, called shortly direct, and (b) free-association with a remote and postponed reference to the problem, called remote, on fluency and originality of ideas in solving ill-structured problems. The research design controlled for possible effects of cognitive style for problem-solving--adaptor versus innovator. The results showed that both groups significantly outscored a control group on fluency and originality. The remote group outperformed the direct and control groups on originality, but not on fluency. Innovators scored significantly better than adaptors in the control group on fluency, but not on originality. No significant difference was found between innovators and adaptors in both direct and remote groups. There was no statistical indication for an interaction effect between treatment and cognitive style. Based upon the results of this study, four implications for learning and instruction have been formulated for designing and developing technological arrangements for learning to solve ill-structured problems. These guidelines will support designers in developing instructional design solutions in educational technology applications. (Contains 2 tables and 1 footnote.)

This article proposes a framework of quality indicators for learning analytics that aims to standardise the evaluation of learning analytics tools and to provide a mean to capture evidence for the impact of learning analytics on educational practices in a standardised manner. The criteria of the framework and its quality indicators are based on the results of a Group Concept Mapping study conducted with experts from the field of learning analytics. The outcomes of this study are further extended with findings from a focused literature review.

Formative feedback enables comparison to be made between a learner's current understanding and a desired learning goal. Obtaining this information is a time consuming task that most tutors cannot afford. We therefore wished to develop a support software tool, which provides tutors and learners with information that identifies a learner's progress, and requires only limited human intervention. The central idea is to use language technologies to create concepts maps automatically from texts, such as students' essays or Blogs. By comparing maps from students over time, or with maps created from tutor's materials, or by other students, it should be possible to ascertain learners' progress and identify remedial actions. We review existing tools for automatic construction of concepts maps and describe our initial explorations of one of these tools. This paper then introduces the theoretical background of the proposed tool, design considerations and requirements. An initial validation, which explored tutors' perceptions of the tool showed that tutors found the approach relevant, but its implementation in practice requires to consider teachers' practices, the tools already in use, as well as institutional policies. (Contains 3 tables and 2 figures.)

Purpose: The present paper introduces concept mapping as a structured participative conceptualization approach to identify clusters of ideas and opinions generated by experts within the domain of mobile learning. Utilizing this approach, the paper aims to contribute to a definition of key domain characteristics by identifying the main educational concepts related to mobile learning. Design/methodology/approach: A short literature review points out the attempts to find a clear definition for mobile learning as well as the different perspectives taken. Based on this an explorative case study was conducted, focusing on the educational problems that underpin the expectations on mobile learning. Using the concept mapping approach the study identified these educational problems and the related domain concepts. The respective results were then analyzed and discussed. Findings: The chosen approach produced several means to interpret the experts' ideas and opinions, such as a cluster map illustrating and structuring substantial accordances. These means help to gain new insights on the emphasis and relation of the core educational concepts of mobile learning. The core educational concepts of mobile learning identified are: "access to learning", "contextual learning", "orchestrating learning across contexts", "personalization", and "collaboration". Originality/value: The paper is original as it uses a unique conceptualization approach to work out the educational problems that can be addressed by mobile learning and thus contributes to a domain definition based on identified issues, featured concepts, and derived challenges. In contrast to existing approaches for defining mobile learning, the present approach relies completely on the expertise of domain experts. (Contains 2 tables and 2 figures.)

To identify and structure potential informal antidepressant strategies that can be used in daily practice for nursing home residents alongside formal treatments. In a first Group Concept Mapping study, residents, relatives, and professional caregivers (N = 124) brainstormed on strategies residents could use to prevent or alleviate depression. In a second study, the same participants (N = 110) reported strategies for use by others. Furthermore, participants rated the expected effectiveness and feasibility of the suggested strategies. Simultaneously, all strategies were sorted by experts and clustered using multidimensional scaling and hierarchical cluster analysis. Six clusters emerged for strategies by residents themselves and five clusters for strategies by others. For residents' strategies, the clusters Being socially connected and Participating in activities were perceived as most effective, as was the cluster Offering personal attention for strategies by others. Participants perceived Creating a healthy living environment as the most feasible cluster executed by residents. Within strategies by others, the clusters Offering personal attention, Using positive treatment/approach, and Using or adapting the physical environment were perceived as the most feasible. The results indicated the importance of social connectedness, a personalized and positive approach by significant others, and tailored activity programs. The results also suggest that adaptations to the physical environment within nursing homes may be an easy applicable strategy to prevent or alleviate depression in residents. Although more research is needed, these findings may guide daily practice and the development of interventions that include informal strategies. Supplemental data for this article can be accessed online at https://doi.org/10.1080/13607863.2022.2057427. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]