Blackboard Tips and Tricks
Organizing Course Areas: Part 3 - Discussion Boards
by: Carolyn Matzinger
Instructional Designer - IDEAL, BGSU

So far in this series, I have shown you a few ways to simplify your Blackboard classroom, by stripping down the course menu, merging similar content areas, and transforming content into easy to read modules. If you've ever used the discussion board, you might find this article useful. Since a bulk of student interaction and learning takes place in the discussion board, it's important to pay attention to how the forums are set up. In this article, I will show you how to organize your discussion board to maximize usability and interaction.

Step 1: Understanding the Structure
Before jumping into the discussion board, it is important to understand how the Blackboard discussion board is organized. Here is the basic hierarchy of a typical discussion:

1. Forum- A forum is a way to organize your discussion based on what is being discussed and the type of questions that will be answered. You may think of this as a folder that contains the related discussions.

2. Thread- A thread is the actual question/idea that will be discussed within the forum. The instructor sets up the thread, and then the students can reply to that thread. Each forum may have multiple threads.

3. Reply- Within each thread, instructors and students can reply to the original thread or to each other's responses.

Step 2: Organizing the Forums
Once you understand how the discussion board works, you then decide how to organize the content. How often will students participate (once a week, every day, etc.)? How many different topics will be discussed? There are four main types of forums that you may use in your discussion board.

Social - This is a place for the students to interact more casually. Many instructors like to begin with a thread for "Introductions" where everyone can post interesting facts and a picture of themselves. Resources, articles, and helpful materials can also be posted in this area to spark more casual conversations. Some instructors like to post "current event" articles or YouTube videos to help students connect the dots from their course topics to the real world.

Weekly - Shorter classes, or seminars may benefit from creating weekly discussion forums. Each week, students can participate in multiple discussions relating to material in the corresponding weekly module. Example: In the first week of the Online Faculty Training course, participants learned about the importance of setting expectations, designing an online syllabus, and using Web 2.0 features in their course. Throughout that week, participants discussed various issues relating to this content in the forum titled "Week 1".

Topical - Longer classes may benefit from creating a few forums based on sub topics or themes related to the main content. You may still have a discussion question each week, the set up will just be a little different. Each discussion question would fit into one of the sub topics, but are not necessarily arranged chronologically. You'll find that as the semester goes on, more and more of the discussions overlap, illustrating how these topics relate to the bigger picture. Example: Early in the semester, students in Biology 101 discussed biochemical cycles in a forum called "Basic Ecology." Later in the semester students learned about pollution, and were asked to discuss pollution and the effects it has on biochemical cycles within the "Basic Ecology Forum."

General - This type of forum is good for administrative discussions. An instructor can create threads called "Questions for Instructor" and "Feedback about Course" to avoid answering the same common questions over and over again through email. This forum is great for answering basic technical questions and getting feedback from the students about what they liked or what could be changed within the course.

Step 3: Stay Involved
Take the lead the first few days/weeks, by facilitating the conversations, responding frequently to student posts, and offering ample feedback. Once your students are comfortable in the discussion board, you can assume more of a "monitor" role. Let the students take control. If discussions become dull or students are not participating fully, chime in with some thought provoking question to get them talking again. Also, make sure they stay on topic and respect any ground rules you set in the syllabus (frequency and quality of posts, netiquette, etc.).

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