Objectives

The objectives are this workshop are to:

· Introduce the LALN to the LAK community. LALN is a global network for networked professional development. The first events were held in October 2019. While there is some overlap with the existing LAK community, there are numerous regional nodes that are not affiliated with LAK. We expect that many LAK researchers will find value in engaging with LALN for their professional development and also for their students to join a global analytics community.

· Explore how LALN can best address the needs of the LAK community. LALN is a grassroots distributed network, connecting regional communities. Research topics and tutorials are locally organized. This approach allows ideas to spread bottom-up rather than in a planned top-down approach. As such, a key objective of the workshop is to hear from the LAK community regarding the types of organizational strategies, frequency of events, and related networking activities that they would find valuable.

Activities

Presentations

This workshop will start with presentations by Professor George Siemens and Professor Shane Dawson. Professor Dawson will detail the challenges of moving research from small lab environments to broader scale adoption. Professor Siemens will address the structure and operation of LALN. These presentations will set the context for group brainstorming and discussions that will follow.

Brainstorming session

Participants will then be invited to a brainstorming session where we will be able to explore and detail the needs that LALN could support. We will discuss topics such as organizational strategies, the frequency of events and networking activities that LAK participants would benefit from. This session will start with participants working in small groups (3 to 5 people) and will conclude with a whole group discussion.

Panel discussion

We will reach out to academics who are running local Learning Analytics communities. These experts will examine the opportunities and challenges of LALN. They will also discuss how to build communities and run sessions based on their experience.