Share Paper: Beyond Threaded Discussions: New Tools and Strategies for Online Courses

  1. Susie Gronseth, University of Houston, United States
  2. Haoyue Zhang, University of Houston, United States
Wednesday, March 28 10:15 AM-11:15 AM Edison Ballroom D

Abstract: An integral component of online and blended courses is discussion Online discussions can be used to establish one’s social presence (both instructors and students) within an online course, and they provide a means for students to make visible their thinking on course topics (Dennen, 2008) Greater learner involvement in course discussions has been shown to correlate with higher levels of student success (Cheng et al, 2011; Dalelio, 2013; Goggins & Xing, 2016; Thomas, 2013); thus improving the quality of the online discussion experience is worthwhile and can have direct gains in learner performance Threaded discussions are often used, but there ...