Chapter 3 builds on the previous chapters and provides a summary of big data-style research within the Community of Inquiry scholarly literature, as well as examples from educational research broadly. This chapter also connects to the broader topics of machine learning, data analytics, learning analytics, and educational data mining. Constructs from the Community of Inquiry are integrated into this synthesis and overview. Unfortunately, only a fraction of the studies in educational research broadly today exhibit the tell-tale signs of big data: data volume and variety, new environments or instrumented sources of larger data, often with emerging tools and platforms critical to the analysis of the resulting datasets. A list of additional readings is provided.
Big Data in Education: Balancing the Benefits of Educational Research and Student Privacy: Workshop Summary