Creating discussion forums

There are various options available for creating discussion forums in the Learning Platform. For a detailed comparison between 'Forums' and 'Forums-Advanced' in Moodle, refer to the linked IMTS Knowledge Base Article. 

Additionally, the FeedbackFruits suite offers two options that allow student interaction via text and multimedia:  

• Discussion on Topic: Facilitates student discussions around a written prompt.  

• Discussion on Work: Encourages discourse focused on a submitted file. 

Moodle Forum activities

For guidance on creating a Forum activity in your subject site, refer to the Set up a Forum in Moodle IMTS Knowledge Base Article.

FeedbackFruits forum activities

Below are resources for setting up the related FeedbackFruits activities, and guides for student use.

• Setting up a FeedbackFruits – Discussion on Topic activity
  • Supporting student guide
• Setting up a FeedbackFruits – Discussion on Work activity
  • Supporting student guide

Educators with the Subject Coordinator or Teaching Staff role can add and reply to discussion topics (posts) in a Forum activity. Depending on the selected settings, students may have the ability to both post and reply or only reply to existing topics.

Creating a discussion post:

1. Click the Add a new discussion button.
2. Give your discussion a meaningful subject or title and type your post in the text editor.
3. (Optional) Attach any related files to your post.
4. Click the Submit button to publish your post to the forum.

Replying to a discussion post:

1. Click on the title of the relevant discussion topic to open the thread.
2. Navigate to the post you want to reply to, then click the Reply link for that post. 
3. Input your reply in the text field.
4. As an educator, you can reply privately to a student by checking the Reply privately checkbox.
   
5. Click the Post to Forum button to post your reply.

Like other activities in the Learning Platform, it is possible to assign marks to a Forum activity. To enable grading: 

1. Select Settings from the Activity settings menu.
   
2. In the Whole forum grading section, select the appropriate Grade Type and input the Maximum grade (i.e., weighting).
3. Choose the Grading method you wish to use: Simple direct, Marking guide, or Rubric.
   
   Note: There is an option provided to add the grade for the Forum activity to a Grade category in the Gradebook. For guidance on creating a Grade category, refer to the Setting up the Moodle Gradebook article. 
4. When setup is complete, click the Save and display button.

To grade students' discussion posts:

1. Click the Grade users button in the Forum activity. This will open a new page where you can view the summary of posts and replies for each student and complete the marking process.  
   
2. Add an overall grade and meaningful feedback for the student in the Grading block on the right side of the window. This block will differ in appearance according to the selected Grading method.
   
3. Use the arrows next to the student's name to cycle through and grade other students.
4. When finished grading, click the Save button.

Apart from the Announcements forum which does not provide an option to unsubscribe, students can manage their individual subscriptions to Forum activities. This allows them to control the frequency of emails notifying them of new posts or replies.