Discussion is a key component of much of higher education. When it works well, discussion can be an effective way of helping students articulate their own ideas, develop a deeper and richer understanding of ideas, and see multiple points of view. Discussion can be challenging to implement. Large class sizes, limited class time, and student personalities (introversion, discussion monopolizers) can make discussion a challenge pedagogical technique.

Online discussion forums have potential as pedagogical tools because they can serve to mitigate some of these challenges. For example, and online discussion is free of the time constraints of the classroom and provides introverted students with plenty of opportunity to formulate their thoughts before contributing them.

Online discussion was a formal part of a recent graduate course on user-centered design that I taught. In addition to the benefits mentioned above, I wanted to use the online discussion as a way to improve the quality of class discussion. To accomlish this, I did the following: a) seeded the discussion with questions related to the readings, b) required each student to contribute at least one posting to the online discussion each week, and c) identified 3-4 students to provide a bridge between the online discussion and the class discussion. Specifically, these students were asked to lead the class discussion by bringing relevant ideas from the online discussion into class.

This process worked quite well, and I plan to use it the next time I teach the class. In my view, not only did the amount of discussion increase, but also the quality and depth of the class discussion. Because of the participation in the online discussion, students were more prepared for the class discussion. The in-class discussion was more focused and also addressed more interesting issues, since many more basic issues had been covered in the online discussion.