13.5. Managing Course Discussions¶

13.5.2.1. Create Course-Wide Discussion Topics¶

All courses include a page named Discussion. When you create a course, a course-wide discussion topic named “General” is already included by default.

You can add additional course-wide discussion topics to guide how learners share and find information during your course. Such course-wide topics might include Introduction and Announcements, Feedback, or Troubleshooting. Discussions in these topics can begin as soon as your course is available.

To create a course-wide discussion topic, follow these steps.

1. Open your course in Studio.

2. Select Settings, then Advanced Settings.

3. Scroll down to the Discussion Topic Mapping policy key. By default, its value looks like this.

   {
       "General": {
           "id": "course"
       }
   }
   

4. Copy the three lines provided for the General topic and paste them above the closing brace character (}).

   {
       "General": {
           "id": "course"
       }
       "General": {
           "id": "course"
       }
   }
   

5. Replace the second “General” with the quoted name of your new topic. For example, name the new topic “Questions about the Course”.

   {
      "General": {
          "id": "course"
      }
      "Questions about the Course": {
           "id": "course"
      }
   }
   

6. Change the value for the second “id” to a unique identifier. For example, append a reference to the name of the topic.

   {
      "General": {
          "id": "course"
      }
      "Questions about the Course": {
           "id": "course_q"
      }
   }
   

   Note

   In discussion topic IDs, you can use only alphanumeric characters and these special characters: underscore, hyphen, and period.

7. Add a comma after the first closing brace (},).

   {
      "General": {
          "id": "course"
      },
      "Questions about the Course": {
           "id": "course_q"
      }
   }
   

8. Select Save Changes.

   Studio checks the syntax of your entry and reformats your entry to add line feeds and indentation.

9. Scroll back to the Discussion Topic Mapping field to verify that your entry was saved as you expect. Entries that do not contain all of the required punctuation characters revert to the previous value when you save, and no warning is presented.

When learners select the Discussion page for your course, the drop-down Discussion list now includes the topic you added.

13.5.2.2. Create Content-Specific Discussion Topics¶

To create a content-specific discussion topic, you add a discussion component to a unit. Typically, you do this while you are designing and creating your course in Studio. Follow the instructions in Working with Discussion Components. The result is a discussion topic associated with a unit and its content.

For information about the visibility of content-specific discussion topics, see Visibility of Discussion Topics.

13.5.3.1. Assign Roles¶

You can assign a course team role to any user who is already enrolled in your course. To assign a discussion administration role, you must be the course author or an Admin.

1. View the live version of the course.
2. Select Instructor, and then select Membership.
3. In the Course Team Management section, select Discussion Admins, Discussion Moderators, or Discussion Community TAs.
4. Under the list of users who currently have that role, enter an email address or username, and then select Add for the role type.

13.5.3.2. Remove Roles¶

To remove a role from a user, you must be the course author or an Admin.

1. View the live version of the course.
2. Select Instructor, and then select Membership.
3. In the Course Team Management section, select Discussion Admins, Discussion Moderators, or Discussion Community TAs.
4. From the list of users who currently have that role, select the user you want to remove, and then select Revoke access.

13.5.5.1. Use Conventions in Discussion Subjects¶

To identify certain types of messages and make them easier to find, you can define a set of standard tags to include in the subject of a post or in the body of a response or comment. Examples follow.

• Use “[OFFICIAL]” at the start of announcements about changes to the course.
• Provide information about corrected errors with a subject that begins “[CORRECTIONS]” or “[ERRORS]”.
• Ask learners to use “[STAFF]” in the subject of each post that needs the attention of a course team member.

Both the discussion team and your learners can use tags like these to search the discussions more effectively.

When a post is created its type must be selected: either “question” or “discussion”. Members of the discussion team should be thoughtful when selecting the type for their posts, and encourage learners to do the same. For more information, see Find Questions and Discussions.

13.5.5.2. Seed Discussion Topics¶

To help learners learn how to get the most out of course discussions, and find the best discussion topic to use for their questions and conversations, you can seed discussion topics in course-wide discussion topics before the course starts. Some examples follow.

• In the General topic (which is included in every course by default), add an [INTRO] post to initiate a thread for learner and course team introductions.
• For each course-wide discussion topic that you create, add an initial post to describe the way you intend that discussion to be used. In addition to providing guidance, these initial messages can act as models for learners to follow when they create their own posts.

EdX strongly recommends that you do not create seed posts in content-specific discussion topics before the course starts or before the containing unit is released. The category and subcategory names for content-specific discussion topics are subject to the release visibility of their containing unit, and are not visible until the unit is released. For more details, see Visibility of Discussion Topics.

13.5.5.3. Minimize Thread Proliferation¶

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

• Pin a post. Pinning a post makes it appear at the top of the list of posts in the discussion navigation pane on the Discussion page. As a result, it is more likely that learners will see and respond to pinned posts. You can write your own post and then pin it, or pin a post by any author. Select the “More” icon and then Pin.

  

• Endorse a response. Endorsing a response indicates that it provides value to the discussion. Select the “check mark” (or tick mark) icon for the response.

  

• Mark a question as answered. You use the same procedure to mark a response as the correct answer to a question as you do to endorse contributions to a discussion: select the “check mark” (or tick mark) icon for correct answers.

• Close a post. You can respond to a redundant post by (optionally) pasting in a link to the post that you prefer learners to contribute to, and prevent further interaction by closing the post. Select the “More” icon and then Close to close it.

• Provide post/response/comment guidelines. You can post information from the overview in this section, or the anatomy of edX discussions in the next section, in a course-wide discussion topic (such as General) to provide guidance about when to start a new thread by adding a post, responding to an existing post, or commenting on a response.

13.5.6.1. View Profile Information for Discussion Participants¶

If you want to find out more about a specific discussion participant, you can view that learner’s edX profile. Learners can have either a limited profile or a full profile.

To view a learner’s profile, follow these steps.

1. On the Discussion page, select a username in a post, response, or comment.
2. On the Active Threads page for that learner, select the learner’s username.

The following image shows a learner’s username in a post, the learner’s username on the Active Threads page, and the learner’s profile page.

For more information, or to create your own profile, see Exploring Your Dashboard, Settings, and Profile.

13.5.6.2. Provide Guidelines for Learners¶

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

You can also share the Participating in Course Discussions section with your learners. It describes features that are available to all discussion participants, and may be useful to learners who are new to online discussion forums.

13.5.6.3. Develop a Positive Discussion Culture¶

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

• Encourage quality contributions: thank learners whose posts have a positive impact and who answer questions.
• Check links, images, and videos in addition to the text of each message. 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 to the most pertinent or active post and then copy its URL and use it to respond to the redundant threads.
• Publicize issues raised in the discussions: add questions and their answers to an FAQ topic, or announce them on the Home page.

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

13.5.6.4. Find Questions and Discussions¶

When learners create posts, they specify the type of post to indicate whether they are asking for concrete information (a question) or starting an open-ended conversation (a discussion).

On the Discussion page, a question mark image identifies posts that ask questions, and a conversation bubble image identifies posts that start discussions. When an answer is provided and marked as correct for a question, a check or tick mark image replaces the question mark image. For more information, see Answer Questions and Mark Questions as Answered.

In addition to these visual cues, filters can help you find questions and discussions that need review. In the discussion navigation pane on the Discussion page, the Show all filter is selected by default. You can also select:

• Unread, to list only the discussions and questions that you have not yet viewed.
• Unanswered, to list only questions that do not yet have any responses marked as answers.

13.5.6.5. Edit Messages¶

Discussion moderators, community TAs, and discussion admins can edit the content of posts, responses, and comments. Messages that include spoilers or solutions, or that contain inappropriate or off-topic material, should be edited quickly to remove text, images, or links.

1. Log in to the site and then select the course on your Current Courses dashboard.
2. Open the Discussion page and then open the post with the content that requires editing. You can select a single topic from the drop-down list of discussion topics, apply a filter, or search to locate the post.
3. For the post or for the response or comment that you want to edit, select the “More” icon and then Edit.
4. Remove the problematic portion of the message, or replace it with standard text such as “[REMOVED BY MODERATOR]”.
5. Communicate the reason for your change. For example, “Posting a solution violates the honor code.”

13.5.6.6. Delete Messages¶

Discussion moderators, community TAs, and discussion admins can delete the content of posts, responses, and comments. Posts that include spam or abusive language may need to be deleted, rather than edited.

1. Log in to the site and then select the course on your Current Courses dashboard.
2. Open the Discussion page and then open the post with the content that requires deletion. You can select a single topic from the drop-down list of discussion topics, apply a filter, or search to locate the post.
3. For the post or for the response or comment that you want to delete, select the “More” icon and then Delete.
4. Select OK to confirm the deletion.

13.5.6.7. Respond to Reports of Misuse¶

Learners have the option to report contributions that they find inappropriate. Moderators, community TAs, and admins can check for messages that have been flagged in this way and edit or delete them as needed.

1. View the live version of your course and select Discussion at the top of the page.
2. In the discussion navigation pane at the side of the page, use the filter drop-down list (set to Show all by default) to select Flagged.
3. Review listed posts. A post is listed if it or any of its responses or comments has been reported. The reported contribution includes a Reported identifier.
4. Edit or delete the post, response, or comment. Alternatively, remove the flag: select the “More” icon and then Unreport.

13.5.6.8. Block Users¶

For a learner who continues to misuse the course discussions, you can unenroll the learner from the course. For more information, see Unenroll Learners from a Course. If the enrollment period for the course is over, the learner cannot re-enroll.

13.5.7.1. Start-End Date Format Specification¶

To close course discussions, you supply a start date and time and an end date and time in Studio. You enter the values in the following format.

["YYYY-MM-DDTHH:MM", "YYYY-MM-DDTHH:MM"]

where:

• The dates and times that you enter are in Coordinated Universal Time (UTC), not in your local time zone. You might want to verify that you have specified the times that you intend by using a time zone converter such as Time and Date Time Zone Converter.
• You enter an actual letter T between the numeric date and time values.
• The first date and time indicate when you want course discussions to close.
• The second date and time indicate when you want course discussions to reopen.
• If you do not want the discussions to reopen, enter a date that is far in the future.
• Quotation marks enclose each date-time value.
• A comma and a space separate the start date-time from the end date-time.
• Square brackets enclose the start-end value pair.
• You can supply more than one complete start and end value pair. A comma and a space separate each pair.

For example, to close course discussions temporarily for a final exam period in July, you enter these start and end dates.

["2016-07-22T08:00", "2016-07-25T18:00"]

To add a blackout date that closes course discussions permanently on 9 August 2016, you add these start and end dates.

["2016-07-22T08:00", "2016-07-25T18:00"], ["2016-08-09T00:00", "2099-08-09T00:00"]

You enter these values between an additional pair of square brackets which are supplied for you in Studio.

13.5.7.2. Define When Discussions Are Closed¶

To define when discussions are closed to new contributions and when they reopen, follow these steps.

1. Open your course in Studio.

2. Select Settings, and then select Advanced Settings.

3. Locate the Discussion Blackout Dates field.

4. If the Discussion Blackout Dates field is empty, place your cursor between the brackets ([ ]).

   If the field already contains one or more blackout dates, place your cursor before the final bracket (]).

5. Enter the start and end date for the time period during which you want discussions to be closed. Be sure to use the required date format specification.

• To define the temporary blackout period in the example above, the field contains start and end dates in the following format.

  [["2016-07-22T08:00", "2016-07-25T18:00"]]

• To add the dates that close the discussions permanently, the field contains a second pair of start and end dates in the following format.

  [["2016-07-22T08:00", "2016-07-25T18:00"], ["2016-08-09T00:00", "2099-08-09T00:00"]]

1. Select Save Changes.

   Studio checks the syntax of your entry and reformats your entry to add line feeds and indentation. A message lets you know whether your changes were saved successfully.

For examples of email messages that you can send to let learners know when the course discussions are closed (or open), see Example Messages to Learners.