edx-platform/docs/en_us/course_authors/source/discussions.rst

.. _Discussions:

############################
Discussions
############################

Discussions, or discussion forums, foster interaction among your students and between students and course staff. You set up discussion topics and categories when you create your course, and then run and moderate discussions throughout the course to guide participation and develop course community. 

Discussions are also excellent sources of feedback and ideas for the future.

For options you can use to run and moderate discussions, see the following topics:

* :ref:`Organizing_discussions`

* :ref:`Running_discussions`

* :ref:`Moderating_discussions`

.. _Organizing_discussions:

*************************************************
Setting up discussions for your course
*************************************************

Discussions in an edX course include both the specific topics that you add to course units as discussion components, and  broader forums on course-wide areas of interest, such as Feedback, Troubleshooting, or Technical Help, that you can add as discussion categories. 

============================================
Adding units with a discussion component
============================================

Typically, all units are added during the design and creation of your course in Studio. To add a component to a unit, follow the instructions in :ref:`Working with Discussion Components`.   

This type of discussion is subject to the release date of the section that contains it. Students cannot contribute to these discussions until that date.

=====================================
Creating discussion categories
=====================================
All courses have a static page named **Discussion**. When you create a course, a discussion category named General is available for you to include by default. You can add more discussion categories to guide how students share and find information during your course. Categories might include Feedback, Troubleshooting, or Technical Help. Discussions in these categories can begin as soon as your course is available.

To create a discussion category:

#. Open your course in Studio. 

#. Select **Settings** > **Advanced Settings**.

#. Scroll down to the Policy Key labeled **discussion_topics**. By default, its Policy Value is:

 | {
 |    "General": {
 |        "id": "i4x-test_doc-SB101-course-2014_Jan"
 |    }
 | }

4. Add a comma between the two closing braces.

 | {
 |    "General": {
 |        "id": "i4x-test_doc-SB101-course-2014_Jan"
 |    },
 | }


5. Copy the three lines provided for the General discussion category and paste them above the closing brace:

  | {
  |   "General": {
  |       "id": "i4x-test_doc-SB101-course-2014_Jan"
  |   },
  |   "General": {
  |       "id": "i4x-test_doc-SB101-course-2014_Jan"
  |   }
  | }

6. Replace the second "General" with the quoted name of your new discussion category.

#. Change the second id value to a unique identifier. For example, append a reference to the category name:


 | {
 |   "General": {
 |       "id": "i4x-test_doc-SB101-course-2014_Jan"
 |   },
 |    "Questions about the course": {
 |        "id": "i4x-test_doc-SB101-course-2014_Jan_faq"
 |    }
 | }

8. Click **Save Changes**.

When students click the **Discussion** static page for your course, the drop-down list includes this new category.

 .. image:: Images/NewCategory_Discussion.png
  :alt: Image of a new discussion category

.. _Assigning_discussion_roles:

==========================================
Assigning discussion administration roles 
==========================================

You can designate a team of people to help you run course discussions. Different options for working with discussion posts are available to discussion administrators with these roles:

* Forum moderators can edit and delete posts, review posts flagged for misuse, close and reopen threads, pin posts and endorse responses, and, if the course is cohorted, see posts from all cohorts. Responses and comments made by moderators are marked as "Staff".

* Forum community TAs have the same options for working with discussions as moderators. Responses and comments made by community TAs are marked as "Community TA".

* Forum admins have the same options for working with discussions as moderators. Admins can also assign these discussion management roles to more people while your course is running, or remove a role from a user whenever necessary. Responses and comments made by admins are marked as "Staff".

Before you can assign roles to your discussion administrators, you need their email addresses. 

* To get the email address for a staff member, on the Instructor Dashboard click **Membership** and then select Course Staff from the drop-down list.
* To get the email address of a student, on the Instructor Dashboard click **Data Download** > **List enrolled students' profile information**.

**Tip**: These instructions are for the new Instructor Dashboard: click **Try New Beta Dashboard**.

To assign a role:

#. View the live version of your course.

#. Click **Instructor Dashboard** then **Try New Beta Dashboard**.

#. Click **Membership**.

#. In the Administration List Management section, use the drop-down list to select Forum Admins, Forum Moderators, or Forum Community TAs.

#. Under the list of users who currently have that role, enter an email address and click **Add** for the role type.

#. To remove an assigned role, view the list of users and then click revoke access (the **X**) next to that email address. 

You can also use the older version of the Instructor Dashboard. You need the usernames of your discussion modertors or students. Click **Forum Admin**, enter the username in the appropriate field, then click the **Add** button for the role you want to assign.  

.. _Running_discussions:

*********************
Running a discussion
*********************

On an ongoing basis, discussion administrators run the course discussions by making contributions and guiding student posts into threads. Techniques that you can use throughout your course to make discussions successful follow.

========================
Seeding a discussion
======================== 

Before you contribute to a discussion, you can decide whether you want to be identified as a staff member or community TA, or to appear like other students' work. Depending on the subject and your purpose, one or the other might be more appropriate to spark discussion and inform students.

You can also post anonymously. Regardless of your role, you can choose to make a post anonymous. However, you may want to discourage your students from posting anonymously, and therefore choose not to use this option yourself.

* To identify your posts with your role, log in with your discussion administrator email address and add the post or response. The responses and comments that you make include a colored banner with either "Staff" or "Community TA".
 
* To post as a student, you must set up an alternate, test account with a different email address, go to the course URL and register, and then join the discussion. Reponses and comments do not have a banner and appear like any other student post. 

note:: Posts by discussion administrators do not include a colored "Staff" or "Community TA" banner. Only responses to posts and comments made on responses do.

==========================================
Using conventions in discussion subjects
==========================================

To identify certain types of posts and make them easier for your students to find, you can define a set of standard tags to include at the beginning of the subject. Examples follow.

* Use "[OFFICIAL]" at the start of announcements about changes to the course.

* Post information about corrected errors with a subject that begins "[ERRATA]".

.. * In the General discussion category, add an "[INTRO]" post to initiate a thread for student and staff introductions.

* Direct students to use "[STAFF]" in the subject of each post that needs the attention of a course staff member.


======================================
Minimizing thread proliferation
======================================

To encourage longer, threaded discussions rather than many similar, separate posts, discussion administrators can use these techniques. However, be aware that long threads (with more than a 200 responses and comments) can be difficult to read and slow to display, and can therefore result in an unsatisfactory experience in the discussion.

* Pin a post. 
  Pinning a post makes it appear first in the discussion, so that it is more likely that students will see and respond to it. Otherwise, each post is listed in reverse chronological order or sorted as each student chooses. You can write your own post and then pin it, or pin a post by any author. Click **Pin Thread**.

    .. image:: Images/Pin_Discussion.png
     :alt: Image of the pin icon for discussion posts

* Endorse a response.
  Endorsing a response indicates that it provides value to the discussion, such as a correct answer to a question. Click the **check mark** that displays at upper right of the response.

    .. image:: Images/Endorse_Discussion.png
     :alt: Image of the Endorse button for discussion posts

* Close a thread. 
  You can respond to a redundant post or response by pasting in a link to the thread that you prefer students to contribute to, and then prevent further thread interaction by closing the entire post or a specific response. Click the **Close** button that displays below the post or response to close it. 

* Provide post/response/comment guidelines.
  A set of :ref:`Discussion Forum Guidelines` or a post in the General discussion can provide guidance about when to create a new thread, respond to an existing post, or comment on a response. 


.. _Moderating_discussions:

***********************
Moderating discussions
***********************

Discussion administrators monitor discussions and keep them productive. They can also collect inforrmation, such as areas of particular confusion or interest, and relay it to the course staff. 

Developing and sustaining a positive discussion culture requires that sufficient moderator time is dedicated to reviewing and responding to discussions. Keeping up-to-date with a large MOOC forum requires a commitment of 5 or more hours per week, and involves reading posts, replying to and editing posts, and communicating with the other discussion administrators and course staff.

For information on setting up moderators for your course, see :ref:`Assigning_discussion_roles`.

========================================
Providing guidelines for students
========================================

You can develop a set of best practices for discussion participation and make them avaialbe to students as a course handout file or as a static page. These guidelines can define your expectations and optionally introduce features of edX discussions. 

.. For a template that you can use to develop your own guidelines, see :ref:`Discussion Forum Guidelines`.

========================================
Developing a positive forum culture
========================================

Monitors can cultivate qualities in their own discussion interactions to make their influence positive and their time productive.

* Encourage quality posts: thank students whose posts have a positive impact and who answer questions.

* Check links, images, and videos in addition to the text that students post. Edit offensive or inappropriate posts quickly, and explain why.

* Review posts with a large number of votes and recognize "star posters" publicly and regularly.

* Stay on topic yourself: before responding to a post, be sure to read it completely.

* Maintain a positive attitude. Acknowledge problems and errors without assigning blame.

* Provide timely responses. More time needs to be scheduled for answering discussion questions when deadlines for homework, quizzes, and other milestones approach.

* Discourage redundancy: before responding to a post search for similar posts. Make your response in the most pertinent or active thread, then use links to direct other posts to that thread.  

* Publicize issues raised in the discussions: add questions and their answers to an FAQ discussion category, or announce them on the Course Info page. 

For a template that you can use to develop guidelines for your course moderators, see :ref:`Guidance for Discussion Moderators`.

==================
Editing posts 
==================

Posts and responses can be edited by discussion moderators, community TAs, and admins. Posts that include spoilers or solutions, or that contain inappropriate or off-topic material, should be edited quickly to remove text, images, or links. 

#. Log in to the course with your discussion administrator username.

#. Click the **Edit** button below the post or response.

#. Remove the problematic portion of the post, or replace it with standard text such as "[REMOVED BY MODERATOR]".

#. Communicate the reason for your change. For example, "Posting a solution violates the honor code."

==================
Deleting posts 
==================

Posts and responses can be deleted by discussion moderators, community TAs, and admins. Posts that include spam or abusive language may need to be deleted, rather than edited. 

#. Log in to the course with your discussion administrator username.

#. Click the **Delete** button below the post or response.

#. Click **OK** to confirm the deletion.

.. how to communicate with the poster?

**Important**: If a post is threatening or indicates serious harmful intent, contact campus security at your institution. Report the incident before taking any other action. 

==================================
Responding to reports of misuse
==================================

Students can use the **Report Misuse** flag to indicate posts that they find inappropriate. Moderators, community TAs, and admins can check for posts that have been flagged in this way and edit or delete them as needed.

#. View the live version of your course and click **Discussion** at the top of the page.

#. On the drop-down list of discussion topics click **Show Flagged Discussions**.

#. Review each post listed as a flagged discussion. Posts and responses show a flag and **Misuse Reported** in red font; comments show only a red flag.

#. Edit or delete the post. Alternatively, leave the post unchanged and click **Misuse Reported** or the flag to remove  the notification.

===============
Blocking users
===============

For students who continue to misuse the discussion, you can block further particpation by unenrolling the student from the course. 

#. View the live version of your course.

#. On the Instructor Dashboard click **Try New Beta Dashboard**.

#. To get the student's email address, on the Instructor Dashboard click **Data Download** > **List enrolled students' profile information**.  

#. To unenroll the student, click **Membership** and in the Batch Enrollment section enter the email address.

#. Click **Unenroll**.