Network Science Approaches to Education Research

He Sun, Peter Yen, Siew Ann Cheong, Elizabeth Koh, Dennis Kwek & Jennifer Pei-Ling Tan

Abstract

In the United States, the Interstate Teacher Assessment Consortium (InTASC) Standards and Education can be generally defined as a process of receiving and providing systematic instruction, and it embodies the verbal and nonverbal networks that the stakeholders (e.g., teachers and students) co-construct. Recent years witness an increasing interest in employing network science approaches to explore the interconnected and non-linear developmental process of education. The current review starts with a brief discussion on the nature of the educational data and proceeds with an introduction to network science history. Relevant network analysis approaches and terminologies are synthesized. Three case studies in Singapore are used to demonstrate how network science approaches can be employed to conceptualize daily educational issues. The findings of the three studies with network science approaches (e.g., motifs detection) may offer educators, researchers, and policymakers novel insights into better pedagogy and strategies for learning face-to-face or online.

Keywords: network analysis, dynamic motif detection, teacher-student interaction, peer- interaction online