Learning Behavior Analysis Using Clustering and Evolutionary Error Correcting Output Code Algorithms in Small Private Online Courses

In recent years, online and offline teaching activities have been combined by the Small Private Online Course (SPOC) teaching activities, which can achieve a better teaching result. Therefore, colleges around the world have widely carried out SPOC-based blending teaching. Particularly in this year’s epidemic, the online education platform has accumulated lots of education data. In this paper, we collected the student behavior log data during the blending teaching process of the “College Information Technology Fundamentals” course of three colleges to conduct student learning behavior analysis and learning outcome prediction. Firstly, data collection and preprocessing are carried out; cluster analysis is performed by using k-means algorithms. Four typical learning behavior patterns have been obtained from previous research, and these patterns were analyzed in terms of teaching videos, quizzes, and platform visits. Secondly, a multiclass classification framework, which combines a feature selection method based on genetic algorithm (GA) with the error correcting output code (ECOC) method, is designed for training the classification model to achieve the prediction of grade levels of students. The experimental results show that the multiclass classification method proposed in this paper can effectively predict the grade of performance, with an average accuracy rate of over 75%. The research results help to implement personalized teaching for students with different grades and learning patterns.