Blackboard allows instructors to set up multiple, threaded, asynchronous discussions from the Control Panel, or from any Content Area.

The Discussion Board is broken down into forums: Each forum represents a particular broad subject of discussion, week of class, or group of users. Forums are further broken down into threads: Each thread is a collection of messages constituting a conversation about a more particular subject. For example, a forum about the United States Constitution may contain a thread about the pursuit of happiness, another thread about the First Amendment, and a third about current proposed Constitutional amendments.

Create a Discussion Forum

1. Click on Control Panel > Course Tools > Discussion Board to see all of your discussion boards; click on the discussion board where you want to add a forum.
   
   
   
   
2. Click on the Create Forum button.
   
   
   
   
3. Fill in the forum title and description.
   
   
   
   
4. Decide on availability of the forum and choose forum settings.
   
   
   
   
   If Allow post tagging is enabled, instructors can create and apply text labels, after they have collected thread messages, to allow for grouping of message independent of thread or thread status. Other Discussion Board users can read, filter, and search messages using the tags, but cannot create new ones.
   Note: If you are using tagging and you notice it's taking a long time for Discussion Board pages to load, turn tagging off. If you use tagging at the beginning of a term, and then turn it off during times of heavy forum usage, you can re-enable tagging later in the term, which will restore all previous tag data.
   
   If Allow members to rate posts is enabled, students can rate each others' posts on a five point scale. The overall rating shown is an average of all rates given.
   
   
   

Subscribe Options

If Allow members to subscribe to threads is enabled, a student can click on the thread to subscribe to, then click the Subscribe button. This provides an e-mail alert whenever the thread is updated or replied to; if you select "include body of post in the email" under "Subscribe," students will also see the content of posts in their e-mail alert. Students can unsubscribe in the same way, but the button will be labeled Unsubscribe.




If Allow members to subscribe to forum is enabled, then you and your students will see a Subscribe button at the top of the page when you enter your discussion forum.



Note that if you choose "Allow members to subscribe to threads," students will have to subscribe to each individual thread.

5. Click Submit. 

 

Note: You can also link to the Discussion Board page, link to a specific Discussion Board forum, or create a new Discussion Board forum from any Content Area using the Add Interactive Tool menu.

To add a Discussion Board to a Content Area:

1. Select the Content Area you wish to add a Discussion Board to from the main menu. Click the Add Interactive Tool button and select Discussion Board.
   
   
   
   
2. You can create a link to the general Discussion Board within this Content Area; create a link to a specific forum within the Discussion Board; or, create an entirely new forum for the Discussion Board. In order to create a link to a forum that has been created in this manner, you must select the Add Interactive Tool button again from the Content Area, and then select one of the first two linking options.
   
   
   
   
   

Notes:

Instructors can enable private Discussion Boards for groups.

Instructors can see statistics of each student’s participation by going to the Performance Dashboard in the Control Panel.  Click Evaluation> Performance Dashboard to display information for a particular student.