One of my weakest areas recently has been online discussion, and not just because Blackboard’s new discussion board is execrable. I’ve been reading up on a good method for summarizing student’s contributions and moving the conversation forward: Collison et al’s Facilitating Online Learning: Effective Strategies for Moderators (2000). I created a summary for our roundtable workshop next week.
The main idea is that the instructor’s posts are “interventions” in the discussion. They should list mini-quotations from several student posts, noting common areas, tensions, etc. in the thread. The instructor then could take on one or more roles, generating a new direction, setting up a concept for reflection, mediating a polarized discussion, or offering an alternative view. All this while trying to avoid grandstanding or hijacking the conversation. The point is to guide the students’ interaction with each other in a way that furthers class goals, answering the needs of the larger group.
