Blackboard: Discussion Forums
The Discussion Board is a communication medium for posting and responding to messages. It is designed for asynchronous use; meaning users are not present at the same time to converse on-line. Email, for example, is also asynchronous, whereas a live chat would be synchronous. An advantage of the Discussion Board is that conversations are logged and organized. Conversations are grouped in threads that contain a main posting and all related replies.
Before you and your students can begin a discussion, you must create a Forum. The Discussion Board area will be divided into multiple Forums that you, the instructor, set up. This allows you to better manage your online discussions. For example, you might want to set up a separate Forum for each major unit involved in your course, or you might prefer to organize your Forums around assignments or case studies.
Creating a Discussion Board Forum
Step 1: Log in to your Blackboard course site.
Step 2: Click on the Discussion Boards option in the Control Panel.
Step 3: Click on the Add Forum button to create a new Forum. This will open the Forum creation form.
Step 4: In the Title field, type a name for the forum. This could be as simple as "Unit 1 Discussion," or something more specific.
Step 5: For the Description, enter the actual topic or question that will be discussed in the forum.
Step 6: In the Forum Settings area, make sure that you leave the "Allow New Threads" option checked, otherwise you will have to post the first thread in the board.
Step 7: Click Submit to create your Forum.
Starting a New Thread
You and/or your students create threads in a discussion forum. The term "thread" refers to a message and all of the replies to that message. Replies are typically indicated by inserting "Re:" in front of the original message's Subject line, however a reply can have an entirely different subject line.
Step 1: From the Discussion Board area, click on the name of the Forum to enter that Forum.
Step 2: Click on the Add New Thread button.
Step 3: For Subject, type in the subject of your new thread.
Step 4: For Message, type in the message you want to post.
Step 5: Click on the Submit button.
Expanding and Collapsing Threads; Sorting
Threads can be expanded or collapsed by using the Expand All or Collapse All buttons. You can also use the (+) buttons to the left of a message to expand individual threads or portions of a thread, and collapse them with the (-) buttons.
Step 1: Click on the Expand All button to expand all the threads to be able to see replies to each thread (this is usually the default view).
Step 2: Click on the Collapse All button to collapse all the threads so that you just see top-level postings.
There are also sorting capabilities within the discussions. The sort feature is located at the bottom of each discussion, and you can sort by Author, Date or Subject.
Collecting Messages
You can also "Collect" messages to view all at once, and to print if needed. Click within the discussion board and click on the "Show Options" near the top of the discussion. Check boxes will appear beside each discussion post. Click in the check boxes of the posts you want to collect to read at once (note- sorting by author before collecting messages can save time). Once you have checked the messages you want to collect, click on the Collect button in your options toolbar. All of the messages you selected will now appear, full-text, on the screen.
