For #TeachingTuesday, let’s talk discussion boards & your online classroom. No doubt they can work just like F2F discussion where students actively listen, make connections, and learn from each other. The key is taking an approach that embraces collaboration and dialogue. (1/8)

The typical LMS discussion board post assignment looks something like this:

https://abs.twimg.com/emoji/v2/... draggable="false" alt="☑️" title="Kästchen mit Häkchen" aria-label="Emoji: Kästchen mit Häkchen"> Complete assigned readings
https://abs.twimg.com/emoji/v2/... draggable="false" alt="☑️" title="Kästchen mit Häkchen" aria-label="Emoji: Kästchen mit Häkchen"> Respond with a paragraph or two of your impressions on the reading
https://abs.twimg.com/emoji/v2/... draggable="false" alt="☑️" title="Kästchen mit Häkchen" aria-label="Emoji: Kästchen mit Häkchen"> Look over what your peers wrote (their responses become visible after you post) (2/8)

Thing is, students may not feel those instructions as geared toward meaningful dialogue. F2F classrooms enable students to hear and respond to each other. As a first step toward promoting that kind of dialogue online, make discussion threads visible to all students! (3/8)

Your discussion prompts are important, too. Don’t just ask students to restate or summarize information. Rather, ask questions that enable students to apply the knowledge they’ve acquired and respond to their peers. (4/8)

Consider dynamic ways to promote dialogue. You can let students post a slide presentation, a recorded video, or even a conceptual map. You might even leave the LMS environment entirely and stage dynamic discussions using Google Slides. (5/8)

Finally, encourage thinking and engagement rather than post quantity. Instead of once-a-week posts, you might build discussions out over a two-week period. The first week can be for writing posts. The next week can be spent responding, thoughtfully, to each other’s posts. (6/8)

Insights for this thread came from “Discussion Boards: Valuable? Overused? Discuss.” an @insidehighered article by Mark Lieberman. Many thanks to him and the educators he interviewed. Read the full piece here: http://bit.ly/3jVJ5fr ">https://bit.ly/3jVJ5fr&q... (7/8)

We also have a full page of our website dedicated to the topic of facilitating effective online discussions. Check it out here: http://bit.ly/HoweToOnlineDiscussions">https://bit.ly/HoweToOnl... (8/8)