Discussion board page

Click Discussion Boards from the Communication area to access the Discussion Boards page. If allowed by an instructor a student can create a forum, otherwise students will only be able to add threads.

Available functions

To access a forum listed on the Discussion Board page click a forum topic link. The Discussion Forum Board will appear. Additional functions are available on this page and are discussed in the following section.

On the Discussion Board page students may access listed discussion boards by clicking on the appropriate link. Once a forum has been accessed a new Discussion Board page appears. Students are able to create new threads from the discussion board.

Forum discussion board page

The Forum Discussion Board will appear as shown below.

Available functions

The table below details the functions available on the Discussion Board page.

To . . .

click . . .

view all messages

the View all Messages up arrow. All messages will be shown.

view unread messages

the View Unread Messages down arrow. All unread messages will be shown.

see all the threads and responses

the EXPAND ALL plus option. All threads and responses will appear.

see only the threads

read a message

a link. A new Discussion Board page will appear. Depending on their course role, users may modify, remove, or reply to a message.

• Default to have the message sort by the earliest date.

• Author to have the messages sort by the author of the message.

• Date to have the messages sort by the earliest date. Note this is the default.

• Subject to have the messages sort by the subject.

About the Options tab

The table below describes the options available on the Options tab.

To . . .

Then . . .

select all threads and messages in the forum

click Select All.

unselect the selections

click Unselect All.

unselect the threads and messages that have been selected and select the threads and messages that have not been selected

click Invert.

mark messages as read

select the threads and messages and click Read.

mark messages as unread

select the threads and messages and click Unread.

view multiple threads or messages

select the threads and messages and click Collect.

lock a thread or message

select the thread and messages and click Lock.

The Create New Thread page is used to add a new discussion. The new thread will appear in the discussion area.

Create New Message page

Click Add New Thread on the Forum Discussion Board. The Create New Message page will appear as shown below. A message may also be added as a response to a post by clicking Reply below a message.

Entry field

The table below details the entry fields on this page.

Message Information

Subject:

Enter the subject of the thread.

Message:

Enter a message.

Select a text type for the message from the following options:

• Smart Text: Automatically recognizes a hot link if it is the first thing entered in the text box or if it preceded by a single space. The benefit of smart text is that it recognizes the Enter key as a paragraph tag. Smart text accepts HTML tags as well.

• Plain Text: Displays text as written.

• HTML: Displays text as coded using HTML tags. Please note that embedded tags and Javascript will be disabled in any discussion board posts.

Options

Post message an Anonymous

Check the box to post an anonymous message.

Attachment

Enter the file path or click Browse to locate the file.