Update 24/06/2014: Recording of the session currently here
For a while I’ve been interested in the intersection between Google Analytics (and Google’s other analytic reporting APIs like YouTube) applied to the field of Learning Analytics. There are a number of features of Google Analytics such as segmentation, a-b testing, event tracking which I believe could potentially give useful insight to teaching a learning, for example, a look last year at tracking and validating MCQs with GA.
One of the reasons for my interest in this area is the ubiquity of Google Analytics, the majority of institutions already using Google Analytics for their main institutional websites. It should not be forgotten that with power comes responsibility. Whilst Google Analytics usage policies prevent you using it to track personally identifiable information you are still tracking people which should never be forgotten.
The Google Apps for Education European User Group Meeting (GEUG14) at the University of York is another opportunity to roadtest some of these ideas. The process for preparing for an event often not only sees me revisiting prior knowledge but is often turned into an opportunity to create something new. This can be a product, like the Google Analytics data bridge made for IWMW13, or new knowledge.
This time personal exploration has taken me into the land of the Google Tag Manager. Those familiar with the mechanics of Google Analytics tracking will know that this usually requires adding code to every page you want to track. Often this can be achieved modifying page templates. But what if these templates are hard/costly to edit or you want to make changes to what is tracked. This is where Google Tag Manager comes in. Like Google Analytics you need to install some code in your pages. After that what and how you track things becomes completely cloud based. Through Google Tag Manager to can add additional code/markup to your pages even setting up rules to decide when these are used. Whilst Tag Manager is build around Google products like Analytics and Ads you can use it for other purposes. This video gives you an overview of Google Tag Manager.
Below are the slides from my session which will hopefully be streamed via Google Hangout 23rd June at 11:30am BST (see programme).