Even as online learning continues to grow in popularity, debates about the many positive and negative facets of online learning continue to take place. One of the most popular forms of teaching and learning in online environments are discussion forums, where students have the opportunity to interact with each other and the professor whenever they want to log in. Students can ask other students about something they were confused about in class or pose questions about an entirely new topic and get feedback. All of this takes place in the form of “chat rooms,” where students have a full view of what they have typed as well as all of the responses from the other people in the room.

So, what are the positives for an interactive discussion environment such as this? One idea is that before a class takes place, the professor can prepare the students for what is going to be taught in class with a brief, pre-class discussion about the topic. This allows the professor to focus on only the new material when the actual class takes place. The professor and students can make better use of class time, and the professor can tailor the lecture to the areas which really interest the students.

Shy students can benefit as well, as they tend to be more likely to feel comfortable asking questions in online sessions than in a face-to-face situation. What’s more, ideas can be written down, erased, edited before presented to the forum, which gives shy students a lot of power over their words. Additionally, “touchy” subjects, which students may not feel comfortable discussing in class, can be more readily discussed in an online format. Students often feel safer in the more anonymous environment of online chat rooms.

Those are some of the good parts to online discussions – but what about the bad parts? Sometimes, there can be too much discussion; students sometimes complain that discussion forums provide too much outside work and professors complain about the heady task of going through the comments and responding to them. Also, students may not write about how the really feel if they know the professor is watching or listening in on what is being written about. Finally, sometimes, online discussion forums are simply not necessary. For course content that does not require a lot of discussion in class, out-of-class discussion sessions may be adding extra work with no added benefits. Some students also prefer the face-to-face format of in-class discussions, where they can get the “expert” feedback of their professors, as opposed to the inexperienced feedback of their peers. Also, if the discussion forum is not moderated or watched by the professor, students might be posing questions to each other about the content they learned about in class or in their readings, but none of them have the answer; if the professor is not present in chat sessions, students could get frustrated.

Online discussion forums and chat rooms are becoming integral parts of many online courses, but it’s important for professors to carefully think about how they will contribute to the overall course before incorporating them. When properly implemented, online discussion forums can add to the learning experience.

Tags: Learning Technologies, Online Education