Tip #28: Discussion Board Changes

In response to faculty and student feedback, some of the features of the discussion boards have changed.

What changes will I see in the Discussion Boards?
You will see improvements to the Discussion Boards. Users will have the option to mark posts as “read” by selecting threads and clicking a Mark as Read button. Users can also see the number of unread posts in a forum and click the number to view those posts.

Users will be able to choose a view setting for their Discussion Board: Tree View or List View. The List View is the view setting currently available in Blackboard. The Tree View is similar to the view setting that was previously available in Blackboard before 2008.

Instructors can enable new discussion forum settings. Instructors can enable tagging, which allows users to tag discussion posts with searchable keywords. Instructors can allow users to subscribe to discussion forums and/or discussion threads. Instructors can also enable replying with a quote, which allows users to embed a quote from the discussion thread to which they are replying.