Drills, Games or Tests? Evaluating Students' Motivation in Different Online Learning Activities, Using Log File Analysis

Abstract

The main purpose of this study is to compare students' behaviors in three types of learning activities (drills, games, and self-tests) in order to explore students' motivation to learn in each one of them. For that purpose, the actions of 7,434 third to sixth grade students, who learned in two learning units, were documented in log files and analyzed. The comparison between their behaviors was based on three variables: (a) the number of students who performed each activity, (b) the percentage of students who completed each activity until they succeeded, and (c) the average response time to questions in each activity. The study was carried out in two stages. Firstly, the students' behavior was examined in one unit and the results were recorded. Thereafter, the behavior was examined in another unit with different activities, in order to validate the results. Results show significant differences in students' behavior with respect to activities in both units. This implies that the drills and the self-test served as motivating tools for learning to a greater extent than the games. We conclude that a greater emphasis should be given to identify under which conditions online activities are more motivating for students' learning processes.

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An Examination of Online Learning Effectiveness Using Data Mining

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