Logic behind "Interactions by Category" in Admin Analytics

Question

Hi Community,

We are currently diving into the Admin Analytics to provide data-driven feedback to our higher education programs regarding course design and student engagement.

Specifically, I am looking at the "Interactions by Category" chart (see attached screenshot). To interpret the data correctly, we are trying to figure out the exact logic behind the "Sum of Page Views" for specific categories.

Does anyone know the precise definitions for the following?

* Modules: Does a "view" here strictly mean a user viewed the Modules Index page (the list of modules), or does it aggregate views of items contained within a module?
* Assignments: Similarly, does this count visits to the Assignments Index page, or does it include views of individual assignment instructions/submission pages?
* Pages vs. Modules: If a student navigates to a content Page via the Module structure (clicking "Next" or clicking the item in the module tree), does this interaction count towards the 'Pages' category, the 'Modules' category, or both?

We want to ensure we aren't misinterpreting high numbers in one category versus another. If anyone has experience with this or can point to technical documentation that defines these calculation rules, that would be incredibly helpful!

Thanks in advance!

tobe_baeyens · Answer

Hi Cassidy,

Thank you so much for taking the time to reply.

My main puzzle is about how the "Page Views" are categorized in the Admin Analytics charts, rather than the active participations.

To clarify, I'm trying to figure out how Canvas attributes a view to a specific category. For example:

* Modules: If the "Modules" category shows 500 page views, does that mean users looked at the Modules Index page 500 times, or does it include views of the individual items housed within those modules? What happens if a course uses modules as the homepage? Does a view of this page count for modules or for the homepage?
* Pages vs. Modules: If a student views a content Page by clicking "Next" through a Module, does Admin Analytics count that as a "Page" view, a "Module" view, or both?

I’m trying to make sure we don't misinterpret the view counts when advising our program directors. If you (or anyone else!) have any insights into the underlying logic for these specific view categories, I would love to hear them!

cassidyporter · Answer

What are Page Views and Participations?

A "page view" is when you open a page in a course. Page views can indicate how a user has been accessing course resources. However, because page view data is based on requests to the server, use page view data only as a good approximation to activity and not an absolute metric. Page view data is most valuable for understanding whether activity occurred, and to make comparisons across students within a course or when viewing trends week to week.

Several actions define "participation" in Canvas and collectively describe events where a user takes an action within a course. The following student actions generate analytics course participation:

* Announcements: posts a new comment to an announcement
* Assignments: submits an assignment
* Collaborations: loads a collaboration to view/edit a document
* Conferences: joins a web conference
* Discussions: posts a new comment to a discussion
* New Quizzes: submits a new quiz
* Pages: creates a page
* Quizzes: submits a quiz
* Quizzes: starts taking a quiz
*

To read up on each section/item and what is counted per item, there are several references to "participate" and "participation". here:

https://developerdocs.instructure.com/services/dap/dataset/dataset-namespaces/dataset-canvas/dataset-canvas-types