Title: Assessment Tool #2 - The Discussions Tool
Course: Dev_TOPKIT_SAMPLE_COURSE_Bauer_S_67 > Section: Week 4 - Effective Online Assessments

<<Note: This content is provided as an example. The content should be updated with your institution's LMS materials.>>

The Discussions Tool allows you to create gradable (and non-gradable/non-assignment) discussion topics to which students can post and reply. Its asynchronous nature is recommended for communication that requires reflective thought. You may use the Discussions tool to generate class discussions, facilitate peer review, and evaluate students based on their responses to open-ended questions. All gradable discussions are considered assignments in <Replace - Your LMS>. The following video provides an overview of creating discussions in <Replace - Your LMS>:

Discussions Tool Video

- Creating Discussion Assignments using the Discussions Tool

Features of the Discussions tool

- The discussions tool provides a variety of settings for you to choose from
  - Graded or Non-graded
  - Delay the posting
  - Lock the discussion topic to prevent students from posting new messages.
- When you create a gradable discussion, a corresponding grade book column is automatically created.
- When you create a gradable discussion, you can:
  - Grade the student’s participation in a discussion by using SpeedGrader.
  - View an activity overview that provides statistics on the average number of messages read, the average number of messages posted, and the average number of replies.
  - View an individual student’s posts and save or print the posts.

Logistical Considerations

There are a few logistical considerations before adding Discussions to your course:

- What is the size of your class?
  - If you have a large class, consider creating smaller discussion groups.
- Will participation in your online class discussions be required or optional?
  - If they are required, you will most likely need them to be gradable
- How many discussion assignments will you have and will your students have to participate in all or some of them?
- Will you grade the discussions?
  - If you grade discussions, what percentage of the final grade will online discussions constitute?
  - How will you grade discussions? Will you use rubrics?
  - Will you use "SpeedGrader" to score each discussion assignment?
- What types of behaviors do you want to see in the online discussions (regardless of assignment type)?
  - Include this information in your course protocols
- What type of instructions will you provide students to guide or prompt the type of discussions you want to see occurring?
  - e.g., broad, open-ended question; question w/ supporting details; scenario; peer-review)
- Where will you place the discussion prompt for each discussion assignment?
  - In the module, in discussion area, both, etc.?
- Who will facilitate each online discussion (i.e., instructor, specified student, TA, outside expert)?
- How will feedback (or scoring) be provided to each discussion facilitator?

Check out the Canvas Help Guide if you would like more information about discussions.

There is no universal way to structure a discussion. To help you think through the options, visit Teaching Online Pedagogical Repository to view best practices for discussions, in areas such as creating a discussion prompt, facilitating discussion as it happens, and evaluating the discussion once it is posted.  Below, we have gone ahead and linked a few select discussion topics from the repository:

- Setting Discussion Expectations
- Discussion Prompts
- Discussion Rubrics
- Group Discussion Strategy

TOPKit Sample Course was prepared by the University of Central Florida (UCF). This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.