Discussions

In your blog, discuss the following questions:

• What role or purpose do discussion forums serve in the online classroom and are they effective?
• How do discussion forums function as a teaching tool?
• How could they be used effectively and ineffectively? Furthermore, what are some best practices for facilitating forums online?

Compose a blog post that addresses each of the points above. After completing a blog post that meets the requirements of this quest, submit the link to your post in the Submission Form at the bottom of this page.

Discussion forums can be very helpful in the online classroom, and they are especially effective when sharing ideas and resources.  They also help build collegiality because students can discuss key ideas as they engage with the material.  They are also wonderful for showing videos and resources.  I especially love it when students App Smash, an idea where you share some resource that you recommend for specific purposes.  And, discussion forums serve as a way of seeing if other students struggle with similar tasks, and you don't have to asked repeated questions because another student may have done it.

For teaching, the discussion forum can even serve as an essay forum.  In my experience, students had to draft an "essay" and post it on the discussion forum.  When this happens, many students attempt to make sure their work is grammatically correct, they make sure their ideas are cogent because these forums actually document what you do.  They also serve as a way of "checking in" for attendance.  I also like to use forums for introductions.

Forums can be ineffective if a teacher just use it for students to "say something."  In those cases, the assignments just are not authentic or intriguing enough.  I am not one that promotes technology just for the sake of it; instructional technology should have specific purposes, and it should enhance what we are learning in class.  Discussion forums are best when probing, authentic questions are asked.  I also think discussion forums are ineffective if you require too many of them.  One discussion per week is more than enough.  Discussion forums should require students to "bring something to the table."  When we read a post, we should have learned something from the post!

Best Practices:

1.  Remind students that this is an academic discussion, so any comments outside the "scope" of the class will be punished;

2.  Tell students to draft their responses on Word or Google Docs and run spell check and grammar check from those resources.  Only after running spell and grammar tools, they should copy and paste their response.  This ensures that they are cognizant of how it sounds.

3.  Think before hitting submit

4.  Superficial comments like "Good Job" benefit no one, and it begs the bigger question if you really read the material or not.  Give comments that enhance the learning atmosphere!  Be specific in your commentary.

5.  Disrespectful, rude, offensive comments will not be tolerated!