Threaded Discussion Pedagogy

Discussion Tips to Students

1. Check in often. This is the number one best way to succeed. If you take my advice to check in and participate at least 4 different days per week, discussion will be much more enjoyable.
2. Read before you post.  This guideline becomes more urgent the later in the week you go. Discussion is a conversation and this means interacting. Why take the time to write a post that is nearly identical to what a classmate had posted three days ago?  A much better option is to join into the discussion already underway.
3. Post early in the week! This clearly relates to tip #2. If you are among the first to post in the week you get to set the agenda. Discussions have to start somewhere and it is the early posters who get to start us off. And realize that most posts made on Friday or Saturday will not get read by many students. Threads are winding down by Friday and Saturday -- use the end of the week to finish off discussions instead of starting new threads
4. Read my posts. No, my posts are not necessarily more important, but I do try to summarize ideas, offer questions to consider, clarify points, and so forth. So, if you have limited time, why not read my posts and start with a reply.
5. Follow a few threads. If you are pressed for time, avoid reading all the posts and instead follow a few lines of discussion closely -- reading and responding in ways that push the conversation forward.
6. As fun as it is to go off on tangents, try to stay focused on the core concepts we're addressing.
7. The number of posts per week will begin to tail off so don't be too worried. One reason is that we'll lose some students over the next few weeks and so there will be fewer of us posting. And, we'll all get better at managing discussions and so we'll make fewer posts but have more fruitful discourse.  Give yourself time to learn how to best utilize the discussion topics -- this is not a natural talent, it is a skill that needs to be developed.
8. Argue all you want. Challenge the claims your classmates make. But, never forget that we are all in this together. There is no room for personal attacks or impolite discussion.
9.  Take the time to experiment with the different viewing options available in the discussions. Check the difference between Threaded View and Unthreaded View. Open and view an entire thread at one time instead of opening each entry individually. If you haven't done so yet, watch the Managing Discussions audio/video tutorial offered on the Week 1 Learning Module.

The Art of Reply.

1. Reply to a post that interests you. You reply might focus on a critique of the original post, you might want to help support a conclusion with your own arguments or examples, you might want to use someone's idea to segue to a related idea, you might want to highlight a theory or concept, or just to push the discussion forward.
   
   
2. Retitle your reply. Change the default post title and compose a title that previews the main point of your reply.
   
   
3. Recap the post you are replying to. In a few sentences summarize the specific aspect of the previous post that your reply addresses. Offer a direct quote from the post when it helps. Refer to your classmate by name. Putting your reply in context will really help the rest of us follow the idea thread from post to reply. And, this recapping will minimize the "one-liner" replies that offer little to the discussion. This will also make for fewer posts but higher quality posts for everyone to deal with.
   
   
4. Respond to the post with your own reasoned views, your clarifications, your questions or your intellectual challenge to the class.
   
   
5. Reengage the discussion. A good reply offers your own unique contribution to the discussion but also intends to re-engage the person you are replying to ~ aims at getting that person (or others in the class) to consider your ideas and reply to you.
   
   
6. Repeat the process. Read the replies posted to your reply and continue the discussion

Loose Threads 

One of my goals for discussion is to get students to interact. That is, to read the posts made by classmates and respond in a meaningful and engaging way.  Thus I aim for a mix of new posts and replies. If everyone makes new posts and nobody replies, then there is no discussion. What I often see in my own classes is great threads starting at the beginning of the week sometimes based on the seeds I plant when I open the topic and sometimes based on original posts made by those great motivated students who post early in the week.  But, as the week progresses, students make new 'original' posts instead of taking the time to join in the discussions that are already underway. Often these new 'original' posts are not new or original at all and instead reiterate ideas already being discussed.  I call these loose thread posts and they can detract from my goal of good interaction.

So, one tactic I use is to lock topics so that no new posts can be made. My discussion week begins on Sunday and I generally lock topics on Wednesday morning.  This allows students several days to make original posts and start promising threads and curtails the creation of the loose threads that I've described above. I have had good luck with this model and it does seem to encourage real interaction. Students are forced to read the ongoing discussions and find a place where they can join in with their own ideas.

Of course, as the instructor you can always make new posts. So this is also a great opportunity for you to plant new seeds half-way through the discussion week!

Discussion Topics vs. Discussion Questions

Just a bit more food for thought for you this week. We often talk about posing discussion questions for our students. I'd like you to consider reframing the way you think about discussion assignments from asking questions to presenting topics.  For instance, this week my Ethics class is focused on the connection between religion and ethics.  I have three discussion topics for the week:

1. Moral Arguments and Religious Beliefs
2. Reactions to Daniel Dennett (an essay we read for this unit)
3. General Issues in Religion and Ethics (Divine Command Theory, Natural Law Theory, Atheism, etc.)

Within each of these three topics there are many specific questions worth exploring. I suggest some specific questions by making my own original posts when I open the topics at the beginning of the week. And, I encourage students to explore these topics by posing and exploring the answers of their own questions.  I think that conceiving of discussion assignments as focused on topics as opposed to specific questions is a more expansive way of thinking about the possibilities of discussion.  I'd love to hear what you think.

Open-ended Discussion Suggestions

• For my open-ended question this week I've chosen to embed a 90-second Youtube.com video into a discussion post. I've asked students to watch the video and respond. I think this video discussion question would be appropriate for many classes so feel free to use it.
  
  
• Here is the video if you want to see it: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=prTC-ZvsHgU&eurl=http://cccs.blackboard.com/webct/urw/lc2119921628071.tp2483593010021/newMessageThread.dowebct?discussionaction=viewMessage&feature=player_embedded
  
  
• I've embedded with a player directly into a discussion post by:
• Creating a new post
• Turning off the HTML editor.
• Pasting in the Embed Code provided by Youtube:

<object width="425" height="344"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/prTC-ZvsHgU&color1=0xb1b1b1&color2=0xcfcfcf&hl=en&feature=player_embedded&fs=1"></param><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"></param><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/prTC-ZvsHgU&color1=0xb1b1b1&color2=0xcfcfcf&hl=en&feature=player_embedded&fs=1" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowfullscreen="true" width="425" height="344"></embed></object>

And, I wanted to offer two tips for managing discussions that might be useful. 

Planting Seeds

Often I'll pose a question but instead of letting students make the first posts, I'll seed the discussion with two or three posts that students can reply to as jumping off points. Many students are reticent to make the first post so these seeds can be helpful.  For instance, I have a tread this week on whether or not it is right be believe things without evidence. I planted two seeds here. One post I made is entitled "Yes, it is always wrong to believe without sufficient evidence." The body of the post just says, "so you agree with this? Explain why or tell me why you disagree."  The other seed is entitled, "Beliefs need no evidence."

Reduce, Reuse, and Recycle

I hope all is going well this week with your discussions.  As you spend more time as an active participant in discussion with students, you'll end up making some good posts.  It is worth taking time now to think about how the content you are creating in your current discussions can make future semesters' discussion more efficient and successful.

Reduce your future workload

One way to do this is to spend less time drafting new original posts for discussion topics.  Over the past few weeks I've suggested planning seeds in discussion topics and each of these seeds is an original post you make. We've also discussed creating more open-ended discussion topics as opposed to focused discussion questions.  More open-ended topics will likely require more work from you since you may want to help guide these topics with lots of original posts.  I suggest that you consider each individual post you make (original or reply) to be a short essay, written lesson, or piece of content. This short essay written this semester can be used again!

Reuse your content

Since you still have access to Blackboard courses from previous semesters, I suggest you go back to Fall 2008 and take a look at the discussions. Open topics and sort posts by author. Select all your posts and click the Create Printable View button. Save this file to your computer and use a name which will remind you of the context (Eric's Posts to Week 3 Religion Question FA 08).  Can any of the posts you made last semester be reused this semester?  Can an original post from last semester serve the same purpose this semester?  Can a reply you made last semester be tweaked slightly so it can serve as an original post this semester?  Can your replies from a previous semester help you create interesting seed posts for a discussion this semester?  I have been purposefully reusing posts from semester to semester for quite awhile and have found this tactic to be extremely helpful.  And, think about archiving the posts you make this semester for use next semester. 

Recycle your content

We've been talking about discussion posts for a few weeks. Let's widen the context a bit and view discussions as just one component in your online class. As I review courses I look for instructor-generated content: lectures, audio files, videos, notes, reading guides, outlines, etc.  These are the materials you create for your online classes to 'replace' the 45-hours content you generally deliver to face-to-fact students: lecturing, giving handouts, showing Power Point presentations, etc.  Can you transform your original discussion posts made this semester into online lectures for next semester?  Often our original posts to discussion are mini-lectures already. Our replies to student posts often try to capitalize on a teachable moment ~ these replies (with some added context) can also be easily transformed into content for a future semester.  Much of the material I now post in my Learning Modules for students to read was originally created during my discussion work.