A New Discovery

I have stumbled upon another great tool on Google: Discussion Boards. I know...nothing new. But, what I realized is that this is a wonderful way for students to turn in papers and get peer feedback with little work from me! A new concept, I know.

I have been using wikis, which have been wonderful, but for a short way to post papers and have them accessible quickly, this is incredible. Check out my seniors' summary response papers. Notice that they haven't quite figured out where to post (all papers should have been under Pages), but once they move them, what an easy way to 1) see if kids typed, titled, included a works cited, etc. and 2) have students respond to each others' writings. They are going to do that Wed. night providing feedback on the writing and their arguments. It should be interesting. I think it's also a great way to "practice" posting responses to reading because this is rampant in college. Professors ask a minimum of 5 postings per class and expect longer responses than a paragraph. This way, our students practice their summarizing, paraphrasing, documentation, and learn how to argue a point logically and with evidence.