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Blackboard survey report 2005 case studies - Assessed discussion boards

Description

While I use the Blackboard facilities to provide course material, lecture notes and bibliographies to students on my third year course (this is through the Course Documents section), I want to discuss how I use the Discussion Board component of the facility.

When designing my third year module, I decided that I wanted to use some form of interactive forum through which students could exchange ideas and discuss the course. My plan was to:

1. Create an e-mail discussion forum, which can be accessed by anyone, registered for my first year module.
2. That all people on the course receive all e-mails sent on this forum.
3. That everyone on the course can quickly and easily respond to the e-mails they receive.
4. That the e-mail discussion forum be used both to debate key issues in the course and for students to gain support in understanding key concepts.

[…] The Discussion Board facility of Blackboard appeared to offer the most effective means for delivering these goals.

In order to implement this plan I felt that it was important to decide what role I would have on the forum as a lecturer. While the forum is premised upon encouraging student interaction and initiative, I felt that as a lecturer I should act as a facilitator for e-mail discussion and participation. In this context I decided to do four things:

1. To introduce and explain how to use the Discussion Board forum within the first lecture of the course.
2. To use the forum as a medium through which to disseminate news, handouts and general domestic information about the course (to get students familiar with the forum).
3. To instigate discussions around key issues in the course.
4. To ensure that issues raised on the forum were also addressed and integrated into lecture sessions.

In particular I decided to use the Discussion Board to support a lecture and video section of the module with which students tend to struggle.

The Discussion Board is set up by an initial Board announcement in which I explain the focus of the Discussion Board and how it will be assessed (see below). I have now used the Discussion Board for three years

In order to ensure full student participation in the Discussion Board I found that it was necessary to make it an assessed part of the course. It is worth 10% of a twenty-credit module.

In terms of students feedback:

• The students felt that to use Blackboard as the basis for group discussion was useful, because it was a facility they already visit to collect course information.
• Students did report that they still felt uneasy participating within the forum. They would regularly check through their responses two or three times before sending it in. They claimed that this was in part a product of the fact that the forum was assessed, but also because they didn’t know all of the people on the forum.
• The students felt that it tested their writing techniques, which are not assessed elsewhere in the course until the examination.
• Students claimed that once they had started to participate on the forum that it was interesting to have other people responding to their ideas. They felt that through these forms of interaction they gradually developed a sense of ownership over the forum, an ownership which made further participation easier.

While they enjoyed participating on the forum, they felt that a virtual discussion group could not wholly replace the experience of face-to-face discussion (both in terms of getting to know others in the groups and the other types of communication which are transmitted via personal interaction).

Summary

Advantages of using Blackboard

Because I have always used the Discussion Board as part of this course it is difficult to assess its impact on student performance. This said, it is clear from examination responses on topics covered by the Board that students benefit from the facility.

Blackboard can store email discussions carried out in previous years. This can provide a useful archive for current students to consult.

Blackboard identifies discussion threads which again are a useful way of following the Board debates.

Disadvantages

Obviously as a virtual discussion board, Blackboard cannot replace the subtleties or skills developed by students in oral communication situations.

Because the Discussion Board relies on written submissions, it tends to assess skills that are already well monitored by exams and coursework assignments.

Unlike other email discussion groups, it does require students to log onto the web site regularly to check discussion development.

Future plans

I intend to make a fuller use of Blackboard facilities and will continue to use its Course Documents and Discussion Boards options.