As we begin to design our blended courses, I am focused on how to create a meaningful environment for discussions between students in the course. Discussions and debates are central to the in-person version of my technology course, yet they are notoriously difficult to recreate in an online environment, particularly with the constraints that Blackboard places on discussions.
One of the major drawbacks of online discussion is the need for asynchronous discussion, which is opposite of the immediate feedback students receive in a face to face discussion. I am considering addressing this issue by making discussions between small groups of students in the class, rather than the typical “post and respond to x-number of others” model. Having one student in charge of a 2-3 person discussion might afford better opportunities for specific feedback and meaningful discussion.
This is something I’ll continue to wrestle with throughout the term, and look forward to seeing how others handle discussions.
I like your idea of having small discussion groups in order to facilitate more personal and immediate feedback – it seems that it would work. I would love to hear the outcome from this organization. In a web-enhanced course that I previously taught, we used a chat tool for real-time discussion and communication. It had other disadvantages, but it does provide a real-time option if you want a “live” feel to the discussion.