Asynchronous Discussions

Asynchronous Discussions

Many instructors and students have used discussions as learning activities. There has also been extensive research conducted on their use. Asynchronous discussions can be a valuable tool for getting students to explore course content together and build upon each other's knowledge. They can be an integral part of the course, when aligned with the learning outcomes and course goals. Asynchronous discussions elicit responses from students that tend to be more carefully thought and formulated when compared with classroom discussions. Often classroom discussions are dominated by more vocal or extraverted students, and some students voices are not heard.  Asynchronous discussions are a way to make learning more inclusive, and make a wider range of students' learning more visible.

Benefits of Including Discussions

• Discussions can facilitate community-building and reflective-practice
• Instructors can take note of and address misconceptions as students demonstrate their understanding
• Students can easily revisit ideas and participate at any time, from any place
• Shy students may feel more comfortable sharing their thoughts in this format
  
  

Research-Based Suggestions 

A considerable amount of research has been conducted on how to best use discussions for teaching and learning. Each course will be different in its own way based on their learning outcomes but some general advice can be followed:

• Be sure students know why they are doing it and how to do it well. This purpose should align with the course objectives (Wade, Bentley, & Waters, 2006).
• Use a discussion prompt or have it related to a specific reading (Wade, Bentley, & Waters, 2006).
• Use a moderator, either you as an instructor, or designate a student each week. There has been some success assigning multiple roles each week. For example, one person to motivate others to keep the discussion moving, one to synthesize the discussion halfway through, and one to summarize at the end (Wise et al., 2012).
• Require multiple posts per week (minimum of two). Since discussions are meant to be a dialogue, multiple rounds of posting are needed to respond to others' ideas, question and elaborate on the points made, and negotiate with others (Pena-Shaff & Nicholls, 2004).
• Recommend a certain minimum and maximum number (3 sentences to a maximum of 200 words) (Wise et al., 2014). Short posts tend to present shallow ideas (Dennen, 2005), but students feel overwhelmed and don’t read long posts (Peters & Hewitt, 2010; Wise et al, 2013).
• Promote and/or require responding to others’ posts. The idea of discussions is to have a conversation and connect ideas, not simply post a paragraph so that the instructor can see they have done their readings. When posts don’t connect to one another, the discussion becomes incoherent and hard to follow (Herring, 1999).
• Encourage students to spread out their posts. Allow them to come in and then spend some time thinking about others’ posts before coming in again (Dennen, 2005).

More on Asynchronous Discussions
This Structuring Asynchronous Discussions — Change the Prompt, Not the Tool: Developing Effective Discussions Links to an external site. document provides details on how to structure an asynchronous discussion and describes strategies for specific types of discussion.

Let's Practice!

Tell us about your own experiences with asynchronous discussions or discussion in general. Where have they worked best? What questions do you have about their use? Based on your teaching experience do you have any tips that would be useful to share with your peers? 

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