If you are going to use a chat room with students in school consider setting up your own chat room so that you control who is involved in the chat sessions. If setting up and maintaining your own chat room is not possible you cam find a quality, controlled chat room and monitor several sessions before using it in class. Always have students use a chat room under close supervision from a teacher or parent volunteer. Using message boards can increase the depth of student understanding as students learn to ask better questions combined with better planning and organization of those questions. A message board is a forum for conversation based around a specific topic.
Messages are e-mailed to the board and are posted there.
These messages will stay on the board so that people may read them, think about them, and then post a well thought out response. Posted messages appear in an easy to read format. Original messages are left justified while responses to new messages are tabbed in one space. Responses to a response are tabbed in two spaces. Consider using these steps to utilize a message board in your classroom.