LEARNING ANALYTICS TO IMPROVE FORMATIVE ASSESSMENT STRATEGIES

In digital education, learning analytics should support active monitoring and dynamic decision-making during learning processes; they are mainly based on digital assessment, through which it is possible to collect and elaborate data about students’ progresses. In this paper we start from Black and Wiliam’s theoretical framework on formative assessment, which identified 5 key strategies that 3 agents (student, peers and teacher) pursue when enacting formative practices in a context of traditional learning, and we integrate it in a framework of innovative didactics. In particular, we consider the use of a Digital Learning Environment integrated with an Automatic Assessment System based on the engine of an Advanced Computing Environment to build interactive materials with automatic assessment according to a specific model of formative assessment. In this framework, rooted in activity theory, the Digital Learning Environment plays the role of mediating artifact in the activity of enacting the strategies of formative assessment. Through several examples of application of automatic formative assessment in several contexts and modalities, we show how it is possible to use the data gathered by the Digital Learning Environment to improve the enactment of Black and Wiliam’s strategies of formative assessment, strengthen and evaluate their action.