Building virtual collaborative skills and a learning community with discusion boards in an inter-institutional online classroom

Dominick M. Ciruzzi* and Steven P. Loheide II

Department of Civil & Environmental Engineering,
University of Wisconsin-Madison, Madison, WI
4. Supporting a learning community: Strong adoption and independent use of discussion boards
*E-mail: ciruzzi@wisc.edu | Twitter: @DomCiruzzi When students are not using the discussion boards to submit assignments, what are they posting?
Supporting student learning with discussion boards
1. Motivation We wanted to create a thriving online learning community to support student learning.
This module had 6 assignments. Each assignment had its own designated discussion board
As a whole, the students appeared to be using the discussion boards more than was required of them for a grade. Examples of what students
posted that were not assigned are provided in the text bubbles below. A “lesson learned” is provided in some of the examples as a way to provide
Challenge #1: Lack of inter-insitutional collaborative experiences for students to ask questions and respond to peers. Instructors could also respond to questions. additional support for these kinds of posts in the future.
Across all research fields, the production of knowledge is increasingly The purpose of these discussion boards were to encourage students to help each other and When discussion threads got long and clut-
Many students were willing to reply to homework questions. Some answers were accurate and helpful, tered, students started responding to posts by
dominated by the contributions of teams. For example, out of 543 for everyone to see questions that would normally be 1-on-1 interactions with the One student started their own and some were not. In the cases where responses were incorrect, the instructors stepped in and addressing individuals and ideas more explicitly
discussion board with another student
active “hydrology” NSF projects, 257 non-unique projects had the term instructors through e-mail. in order to complete a paired homework
appreciated the students help and refocused the responses in order to answer the original question. (i.e. “I would like to address [Student’s name]
point about modeling parameters”).
‘collaborative research’ in the title. However, we rarely collaborate in the assignment, which led to a high
number of indendent posts.
formal, classroom training of our graduate students across university For assignments, we required a total of 8 posts per student throughout the module. For this Lesson learned: Use this posting framework
in the future to help organize posts.
boundaries, nor do we train our students for virtual collaborations. teaching-as-research project, we assessed and evaluated the posts made independent of Lesson learned: Encourage this
behavior!
assignments (Figure 2 to the right).
Challenge #2: Online classrooms lack engagement 11/12 students
Explicit expectations and support on how to use discussion boards Students posted a
A pre-survey confirmed that graduate students want online classrooms to be more said they liked
We provided extensive support to students on how to use discussion boards to complete total of 218 times.
engaging. They voiced concerns,“I am mostly concerned about how online lectures using discussion
assignments and interact with each other as seen below: 61% of posts were
will affect my engagement with the material and other students in the course” ... boards
“I learn best when I can personally interact with my instructors and peers. I worry independent and not
Provide guidance and structure Individual vs. group
that being physically separated will make it hard to ask questions or have in depth required
to help students plan accountability Even though we explicitly asked
students to ask homework questions
discussion.” One student started a discussion to the discussion boards, we still
Explicit expectations on how to use the Explicit expectations on what is the thread. They followed up on a lecture received numerous individual emails

2. Teaching-as-Research questions space, how posts should be structured,

and a rubric for how posts will be graded
group contribution and what is
and provided a YouTube video and paper
to a relevant study that connected well
to class content.
with homework and assignment
questions. Some of these questions were
later asked on the discussion board.
individually being evaluated.
(1) How do students use discussion boards independently?
Lesson learned: Students are willing Lesson learned: Reinforce using
Teach and reinforce to share their experiences and knowl- disucssion boards for these questions and
(2) Do students feel more comfortable collaborating across edge with the class. Provide explicit
conflict-resolution skills: do not answer individual emails
institutions and in virutal environments after this module? Establish ground rules
opportunities for students to share. regarding homework questions.
For group assignments, we reinforced FIGURE 2. Discussion board network map. This figure describes the quantity of posts and interactions made by each individual in the online module. Each big circle represents a
that it is ok to disagree with one another,
3. A diverse online classroom but that they must find common ground
Examples: communicate with each
other in a timely manner, say why
person (green = student, blue = instructor), the color of the outer ring of each circle represents a different institution. The top number is the total number of discussion board inter-
actions involving that person, the number in parentheses is the total number of independent posts that were not assigned. The smaller circles coming out of each big circle represent
to submit assignments. We provided the number of times each person started something new: green is a new discussion thread and orange is a new discussion board (only one student started a new discussion board).
The Consortium of Universities for the Advancement of Hydrological Sciences, Inc. you agree/disagree with comments, The thickness of the lines connecting the circles represents the quantity of interactions between those two individuals.
examples of the language to use if/when
(CUAHSI) Virtual University comprises of 7 universities in the Fall 2018 semester. respond politely but honestly, In addition to posting to complete assignments, students used the discussion board independently to...
this occurs (e.g. explain why you disagree
Each institution has a faculty host that will teach a month long synchronous on- criticize ideas not people, etc. Coordinate how to complete group work, ask questions related to course logistics, ask questions related to assignments, provide additional resources
and provide a plan to compromise)
line module on a specialty hydrologic topic of their choice that is not traditionally to class related to course content, respond to peers questions, and thank peers for providing help, resources, constructive comments
offered at all universities. Students from these institutions enroll in three of these
modules throughout the semester for a total of three credits.
5. Increase in comfort to 6. Increase in confidence to 7. Lessons learned
Thus, each online classroom is hosted by at least one instructor and any where
between 10 and 25 students from as many as all 7 universities creating a diverse collaborate across institutions collaborate virtually • We were surprised by the number of independent posts made
by students as well as the high number (11/12) of students
online environment. Overall, students indicated that they are willing and feel more
The majority of students said they feel more comfortable that liked using discussion boards.
Michigan State University University of Delaware
comfortable to collaborate virtually. Here is a representative
CUAHSI Virtual University collaborating across institutions as a result of this module.
Fall 2017 sample of responses to survey questions about this: • We think this strong adoption is attributed to the ample
Online Module Throughout the module, we paired students “I feel much more comfortable collaborating in a virtual environment after this module” support and explicit expectations we provided for the
from different institutions to complete discussion boards.
“The tasks we were ask to collaborate one did not seem like actual collaboration. For
University of Nevada
University at Buffalo Reno

assignments. One assignment was a reading both tasks, I had the same experience of myself and partner being so busy that we • In the future, we may decrease the number of required
critique, and another was a presentation of just split the work and combined rather than true collaboration.” posts and encourage and emphasize using the discussion
a peer-reviewed article of their choosing boards to create a thriving learning community.
University of California
Santa Barbara
University of Wisconsin
Madison
related to class content. “After this module, I do feel comfortable collaborating in a virtual environment. Knowing
that everyone has a different background, it allows for many different thoughts as well as
better understanding of the assignments sometimes.”
“Yes, I am comfortable and willing to collaborate in a virtual environment. I think developing
8. Acknowledgements
FIGURE 1. Design of the CUAHSI Virtual University. Students from participating univer- We would like to thank Devin Wixon for her guidance and thoughtful suggestions through-
sities can choose three modules over the course of the semester. Each module is led by rich remote relationships is a valuable skill.  Most experts in your field don’t work in your office.  out this project. Also, we would like to thank the Fall 2018 Delta Intern Cohort for their sup-
port. This material is based upon work supported by the National Science Foundation (Grant
at least one instructor on a specialty topic of their choice in their field of expertise, such Finding creative ways to create strong, meaningful, and ultimately rich relationships through 1700983 & 1338606) and an Educational Innovation Award by the College of Engineering at
as drone applications, groundwater dependent ecosystems, groundwater-surface water creative remote engagement will help generate profound collaborations.” the University of Wisconsin – Madison.
interactions, and modeling ecohydrological processes in R.