Understanding Youth’s Personal Connection to Data in a Gamelike Assessment System Through Learning Analytics and Qualitative Analysis

In this paper, we explore middle school students’ understanding of data in a gamelike assessment system called “Beats Empire.” Beats Empire situates students as music studio managers. Students use their data-analysis skills to sign artists, record songs, and determine song-release strategies to win the game. We
examine how gameplay can engage students in playful construction tasks that elicit computational thinking
about data. To this end, we draw qualitative data from students’ play-aloud interviews and log data from
classroom implementation of the game. The complementarity of learning analytics and qualitative analysis leads us to better understand how students make data-oriented gameplay decisions while actively connecting data from the insight screen with their personal experiences in music when recording new songs. The study provides methodological input on how qualitative analysis and log-data learning analytics can build upon each other to explore students’ behaviors in an open-ended learning environment. It showcases the importance of integrating both quantitative and qualitative data. On the one hand, learning analytics is a useful tool for capturing insights from the students’ gameplay experience. On the other hand, qualitative analysis provides space for students to explain their actions and what is meaningful to them.