How to Make Discussion Boards Come Alive!
By: Alexis Castorina
Tags: Learning Management, Edtech, Social Learning, Higher Education, Education

Learning management systems have come a long way since the late 90's, yet for some reason, discussion boards haven’t progressed at the same pace. Discussion boards, or forums, were created so that online modalities could mimic the same conversational learning environment that exists in a typical face-to-face classroom setting. However, as many can attest, some online discussion boards today are no more than a copy/paste regurgitation of what’s written in a course lesson or text book.

<<Yawn>>

Don’t worry. You CAN facilitate meaningful dialogue with your online classroom. Even if you’re working with an older LMS, your faculty and student experiences can be authentic. And, they can mimic the look, feel and interaction of your favorite social media platforms. Here’s how.

Cat yawning… after presumably experiencing a boring discussion forum.

Add Visual Interest and Social Media Elements

Think about your classroom’s current discussion board. Does it feel static and stale? Quite often discussion forums can look like long, overwhelming blocks of text. There’s no visual interest or anything drawing your students’ eyes into the conversation topic.

You need to use a social learning platform with features built in for multimedia and images. Notebowl’s discussion boards have social media functionality where students can “comment” and “like” posts, attach files, and share GIFs, images and videos.

Encourage your students to post videos and images to share examples relevant to the discussion topic at hand. Communicate like you mean it with your students. Have them share their thoughts organically, ask questions, share files and images all in one location. To further elicit engagement for your shy students, you can enable an “anonymous” setting so they can still post even if they’re reticent about a specific question.

Tip: Infographics are a student favorite!

Require Profile Photos and Customization

Student-friendly discussion boards drive interaction with familiar social features. Require your class to publish profile photos and complete bios. Adding bio information and profile photos for students will make the experience feel more authentic and personal. Faculty can provide a template at the start of each course that students can complete. Have an intro assignment where students reach out to two classmates and begin a discussion about their background, career goals, and even ask more personal questions like favorite sports teams!

Example: Students discussing a project on a Notebowl Discussion Board

Pose Open-Ended and Probing Questions

It’s easy for students to respond with generic comments and statements on discussion boards. Get them to elaborate.

“Why do you think that? What have you experienced in the past related to this topic? Can you think of someone famous today who would fall into that category?”

These are examples of the types of probing questions that will get students to relate the lesson topic to their own perspective and observations.

Discussion Boards with Notebowl

Like a classroom, Notebowl is inherently social. It’s designed to naturally extend classroom discussions online. Questions are easily answered in a place that everyone can see, and features for comments, likes and sharing encourage participation.

Faculty and administrators enjoy the advanced analytics dashboard features allowing them to customize, analyze and report on various activity and engagement metrics — even word count!

Don’t worry if your existing LMS doesn’t have a user experience that feels like social media. Yes, Notebowl is a standalone social learning platform that can fully replace your current learning management system. But, even if you’re not in the market or ready for a complete overhaul, you can seamlessly integrate Notebowl’s most powerful social features like discussion boards and the newsfeed on top of your existing LMS. No need to wait for existing contracts to expire.

What other ways have you seen discussion boards come alive? Add a comment and share your ideas and recommendations!