Online students' LMS activities and their effect on engagement, information literacy and academic performance

The purpose of this study was to examine online students' LMS activities and the effect on their engagement, information literacy, and academic performance. The participants of the study were 65 undergraduate students enrolled to an online "Computer Literacy" course. Cluster analysis was performed on the log data gathered from LMS activities, and participation levels were grouped according to two levels, as high participation and low participation. Multivariate analysis of variance (MANOVA) revealed that LMS participation levels could play an important role on student academic performance and engagement, but not for student information literacy. Closely monitoring student participation levels can help instructors determine students' needs and support learning accordingly. It can be stated that high levels of student participation enhance students' engagements to online courses. Thus, learning difficulties in online learning environments can be prevented. These findings may have implications for students' online learning processes, and also for instructional designs as they play an important role in enhancing students' success in online learning environments.