Discussions
The Discussions feature is intended primarily for teachers or course administrators to set up forum discussions for students enrolled on a Canvas course. The Discussions feature can be used to enable students to discuss subject content, or perhaps interact with a visiting external expert. Discussions can be posted for all students, or sub-sets of students (if Sections have been defined in the course).
Creating Discussions
The Discussions tool is accessed via the Course Navigation menu on the left-hand side. To create a new discussion, select the + Discussion blue box and complete the fields on the next screen.
Using Discussions
Discussions can be used to:
- Help students interact with each other about subject content
- Check understanding of course content
- Follow-up on lectures or conversations that took place in physical learning spaces
- Debate contradictory ideas
- Brainstorm different approaches to a problem
- Interact with a visiting expert for a specified time period
Discussions work best when students clearly understand their purpose and how they contribute to their learning, so make sure you explain this as part of setting up a discussion.
Please refer to further Canvas documentation for Discussions Links to an external site..
Discussions Links to an external site. can be created as an assignment for grading purposes Links to an external site.or remain ungraded (e.g. a student forum or course Q&A). When you set a discussion to graded, the options for creating an assignment will appear.
Consider whether or not you want to enable the following setting in the Options section:
In the course Settings, under More options:
- Disable 'Let students edit or delete their own discussion posts'.
- Disable 'Let students create discussion topics'.
- Disable 'Let students organise their own groups'.
You can also decide if it would be beneficial to "Let students attach files to a discussion." Links to an external site.