posted on 2021-11-23, 13:47authored byMarkus Wolfgang Hermann Spitzer, Raphael Gutsfeld, Maria Wirzberger, Korbinian MoellerKorbinian Moeller
Background: Due to the COVID-19 pandemic schools all over the world were closed
and thereby students had to be instructed from distance. Consequently, the use of
online learning environments for online distance learning increased massively.
However, the perseverance of using online learning environments during and after
school closures remains to be investigated.
Method: We examined German students’ (n ≈ 300,000 students; ≈ 18 million
computed problem sets) engagement in an online learning environment for
mathematics by means of survival analysis.
Results: We observed that the total number of students who registered increased
considerably during and after school closures compared to the previous three years.
Importantly, however, the proportion of students engaged also decreased more rapidly
over time.
Conclusion: The application of survival analysis provided valuable insights into
students’ engagement in online learning - or conversely students’ increased dropout
rates - over time. Its application to educational settings allows to address a broader
range of questions on students’ engagement in online learning environments in the
future.
This paper was accepted for publication in the journal Trends in Neuroscience and Education and the definitive published version is available at https://doi.org/10.1016/j.tine.2021.100168