Discussion Forums, Bulletin Boards

What are they?

A discussion forum is an online “area” where participants exchange their views and opinions on a given topic. It is usually designed for asynchronous use, in that the participants do not all have to be available at the same time. Instead, the system stores each person’s contribution, or “posting,” and displays it to other participants the next time that they log into the forum. However, a forum can be used for the “live” exchange of views as well.

Discussions can be “threaded,” with postings on the same sub-topic appearing together. This makes it easier for the teacher to structure the discussion and for participants to follow related exchanges. However, it means that people have to make multiple postings if they want to contribute to different aspects of the discussion.

Discussion forums are sometimes also known as bulletin boards.

See also chat.

How can I use them with my students?

A discussion forum is a powerful and popular tool for collaborative learning through the social construction of knowledge. You can use it in three main ways:

• As a means for learners studying online course to take part in a discussion which would otherwise be impossible.
• To continue a discussion that has begun in the classroom or, conversely, to gather initial opinions in advance of a face-to-face class.
• To make it possible for students who are less forthcoming in oral discussions to express their opinions.
• To trigger students' reflection in their learning, e.g. by asking a single short, but focused, question.

Some tutors have also found discussion forums useful for scaffolding the development of students’ skills in analytical writing, in that it provides an intermediate stage between oral discussion and formal writing: i.e. they are expressing themselves in written form, but in a conversational style.

Anonymity in discussions:
You will need to decide whether or not students will be identified by name in a discussion. Allowing students to remain anonymous may make them feel more confident to express their opinions, especially on ethical matters.

Taking part in a discussion yourself:
You can either allow the students to conduct their discussion privately or take part in the discussion yourself. If you do participate, you will almost inevitably spend more time in the forum than you envisaged. When planning a course that will include asynchronous online discussions, follow these tips from other teachers:

• If the forum supplements a face-to-face course, reduce your contact time in order to accommodate your new online role.
• Copy your own contributions and paste them into a word-processed document so that you can re-use them with future cohorts (this is almost certainly quicker than retrieving them from the previous year’s archived discussion).
• Decide on fixed times for taking part in the discussion and tell your students when you will be online. Then they will know when they can expect you to answer any specific questions that they raise.

To find out about the issues involved in running a discussion, read the  use case discussion from the LADIE project (Designer's note: to be rewritten).

Examples

• Overviews of forums used to stimulate reflection, maintain contact between face to face sessions and solicit peer critique and support, from Design for learning in Virtual Learning Environments - Insider perspectives.
• These  casestudies from the D4L eLIDA camel project reflect on learning designs that use forums.
• These two examples from the  LADIE project illustrate the use of forums with distance learners (Designer's note: these use cases will be rewritten in due course):
  •  Use case 7 (Journalism)
  •  Use case 11 (reflective

How can I get access to one?

Discussion forums are normally provided as part of a VLE, and you can have a separate forum for each course or module (restricting access only to the students taking that course/module).

Discussion areas are also embedded in other tools. For example:

• Some wikis have discussion areas attached to individual pages.
• Blogs allow others to voice their opinions on each “post” by the blog’s owner.

You can find a  list of free discussion tools and related software, as well as further tips on how to use them, on the Website of the  Centre for Learning & Performance Technologies.

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