CloudDeakin:
Prepare and Monitor
CloudDeakin:
Assessment and Feedback
CloudDeakin:
Discussions
CloudDeakin: Discussions
CloudDeakin discussion forums enable asynchronous connection and communication between students and their peers throughout the learning experience. They provide a platform where students can search, pin, and like posts, fostering engagement and collaboration in the learning experience.
The discussion forum allows users to:
- Engage in threaded discussion
- Learn from peers by sharing resources, perspectives, and feedback ;
- Facilitate discussion on foundational concepts;
- Subsribe to discussions and customise their experience.
AI elements
CloudDeakin currently does not have AI features enabled. For information on potential future features, click the ‘Find Out More’ button below.
List of functions
- Unique layout options: the grid view has proven to provide a better user experience;
- Option to subscribe and personalise notification settings;
- Capability to initiate group-based discussions to engage larger cohorts;
- Multiple sharing options including links, videos, and images.
Reasons to use discussions based on Deakin Design Principles are:
- Enhanced engagement: facilitate asynchronous connection and communication between peers
- Active learning: encourage active participation, facilitating interaction with key concepts and ideas.
- Inclusivity: provide a platform for all students to voice their opinions and contribute to the conversation.
- Authentic learning: enable students to apply their knowledge to real-world scenarios and problems.
- Feedback and reflection: allow for continuous feedback and reflection, helping students to see their progress.
Support resources
Deakin Resources:
CloudDeakin Guides: An overview of all CloudDeakin features. Navigate through the section to find out more about how to leverage the features mentioned above.
Vendor resources:
D2L Support Guides: Ask a question, and access resources when you need them
Examples
The use cases below showcase some ways in which you can use CloudDeakin discussion forums in your practice:
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Knowledge Acquisition
Support demonstration of discipline knowledge – online asynchronous discussion as an assessment option
As a teacher I want students to discuss key ideas and to demonstrate their conceptual understanding; to express their viewpoint and support it with evidence, and to consider and respond to counter-arguments to evidence their knowledge.
My students can actively participate in discussions to articulate, consolidate, and evidence their understanding of key concepts.
Example design considerations when seeking evidence of new knowledge through discussion:
- Clearly define the aims for a purposeful, respectful, inclusive discussion.
- Formulate purposeful open-ended questions or topic themes for your students to discuss, which will require engagement with core concepts.
- Clearly communicate what is required for assessment and the purpose.
- Consider allowing students to choose a given range of their discussion contributions for assessment. This embeds a reflection component, as students revisit their posts and self-evaluate the quality of their engagement with their new knowledge.
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Inquiry
Guide dialogic inquiry – student case-based learning through group discussion
As a teacher I want my students to use an inquiry approach as they work in groups to discuss an unfolding discipline-relevant case study.
My students can engage with a complex, real-world case study, making inquiries and applying new knowledge and key concepts through group discussion.
Example design considerations when guiding inquiry-based learning through case study discussion:
- Use CloudDeakin Groups and Discussion functions to establish student discussion groups.
- Prepare how the case study will unfold, e.g. each week release a stage of the case and a provocation question over three weeks, or other staging to allow iterative engagement of the inquiry process and application of core concepts.
- Consider preparing multiple case studies, and either allocate randomly or ask students to opt in to their preferred case study group.
- Communicate to students a clear timeline, including when to complete group discussions, the milestone outcomes expected of each discussion stage, and when next case detail will become available.
- To increase motivation and to enhance learning from each other consider promoting a sense of competition, e.g. each group presenting a snapshot summary of their outcomes at each stage.
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Discussion
Guide and enable asynchronous discussion – anytime, anywhere discussion
As a teacher I want students to be able to discuss key ideas so they can challenge and respond to each other online, and where I can provide guidance and feedback.
My students can articulate their learning around key ideas, to formulate questions, and make meaning of core concepts by discussing them with others.
Example design considerations when supporting asynchronous discussion using CloudDeakin:
- Provide clear expectations for online discussions, including:
- respectful and inclusive language and behaviour
- how frequently you will respond to posts compared to monitoring peer learning
- Help to shape and structure the discussion by posing critical, open-ended questions or provocations aligned to real-world contexts.
- Consider artefact-centred discussion, e.g. embed an artefact (document, video, audio, graph, photo) in the introduction post and provide purposeful reasons to discuss the artefact.
- Create (or ask your students to create) criteria for when to use the ‘Like’ function, e.g. well-argued contribution, or contributed meaningfully to another student’s idea or suggestion.
- ‘Pin’ a quality discussion thread so that it rises to the top, and therefore draws attention for others to read it, helping to model a good discussion approach.
- Inform students how to subscribe to discussions, to activate notifications when others contribute to the discussion.
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Collaboration
Create a collaborative communication environment – learning through collaboration
As a teacher I want my students to use discussion as a key vehicle to collaborate on a purposeful learning task.
My students can build a sense of connection within the cohort while they actively participate in collaborative discussions centred around a learning task.
Example design considerations when creating a collaborative communication environment using CloudDeakin Discussion:
- Prepare a purposeful, suitably complex discussion task that your students can actively collaborate on.
- Motivate students to contribute by fostering an encouraging, trusting discussion environment, affirm contributions, and give constructive feedback.
- Consider providing criteria for when to use the emoticon function on a post (e.g. a ‘like’ for sharing a good resource or discussion point).
- Consider allocating students into random groups so they can work in teams and meet people with different perspectives while they collaborate on the learning task.
CloudDeakin: Assessment and Feedback
Guides and Resources
