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Creating active discussions within Microsoft 365
One of the key benefits of Microsoft 365 is the way which we use it to create discussions to further support the idea of collaboration and productivity. There are many elements which can focus on creating active discussions with Microsoft 365 being at the heart of everything as a connecting hub.
Feedback can be achieved by sharing documents and collaborating through comments within documentation. Enabling an active and development discussions
Teams can be used via channels to create discussions boards or discussion threads around key topics, activities or concepts.
Using the Q & A or discussion thread feature within live synchronous meetings to organise and structure sessions dialogue.
Collaborative Feedback in MS Word & PowerPoint
Most students will be very familiar with MS Word and MS PowerPoint. The advantage of using such familiar tools is that minimal time and effort is required by students to learn to use them, enabling them to engage with the learning activity almost immediately.
The comment function, with its options to reply, tag people, and start a conversation thread, allows students to provide and respond to feedback in real-time within shared documents. Students can also mark comments or threads as completed to help them keep track of feedback that has been actioned.
The approach you take is flexible and customisable depending upon your objectives and your students’ needs. You could ask students to reflect upon and article, or critique a sample essay. You might split students into groups and get them to produce their own section or slide and then ask another group to give feedback.
We recommend providing students with a feedback model (such as the Stanford Method or the SKS model) so that they are providing constructive, actionable comments. It is important that you are facilitating and, where needed, contributing to these discussions throughout the activity.
Resources
We have curated some resources to help you get started with the tools.
Teams as a discussion area
Microsoft Teams is able to act as a discussion hub for you and your students to support interactive and collaborative approaches. Since Microsoft Teams is now integrated with Blackboard, it can sync directly with your student list to create a central space for your students to share, discuss and interact.
Once a Teams site has been connected, this can be used to create channels for particular topics, weeks or even tasks enabling students to gain access to materials and then use the discussion elements to further actively develop their learning through key approaches. The benefit of using this as a discussion area means that students can not only reply and create new ‘thread’s of discussion but they can easily connect further information, links and wider documents to embellish the conversation.
It is recommended that if you are planning to use teams as a discussion board that you think about:
- Managing the expectations of how the tool can be used.
- how the discussions are organised within teams.
- how the discussion activity will feedback into the wider learning.
Resources
We have curated some resources to help you get started with the tool.
Online synchronous discussions for group work
Teams has multiple features built in to support online synchronous discussions. Teams has multiple functions built in to really support discussions when teaching synchronously online.
Q & A feature
When running a live session, you can from the meeting options, activate the question and answer feature. This is especially useful when looking at key concepts or ideas and helps you and the students organise your thoughts and outputs. Each question is then grouped directly with the answers, so unlike normal chats where you have to search to find the answer, students can access each question and their responses individually. This is also stored historically to help with revision or reminders. Students can also ask anonymously and this can be moderated if you wish.
Two choices
Students can choose if they would like to ask a question or start a discussion thread.
Question – Useful for specific questions that students have about key concepts or specific module requirements.
Discussion – Useful to start wider conversations with peers around thoughts and opinions, as well as sharing wider contextually appropriate content.
Resources
We have curated some resources to help you get started with the tool.
Breakout rooms
Breakout rooms are really useful ways to organise groups and enable students to work with each other collaboratively in private spaces online. Using breakout rooms effectively relies on organisation, a clear purpose and output. I.e. breakout rooms should only be used if there are clear reasons behind creating an online group activity. To help manage breakout rooms it is recommended that:
- Think about communication: you think about the messages that can be communicated with groups through the announcement tool. Including, timings and clear instructions for the task.
- Put in structure: How will the students be expected to interact within the space and what is the expected output for the task.
- Be involved: The breakout room manager will enable you to visit any room that has been created, to help support and redirect students visiting rooms during the activity can be a useful way of managing expectations, stretching and supporting student outputs as well as delivering wider instructions if required.
We would recommend thinking about the purpose of the activity and following the instructions created within the Digital Education Resources Hub to look at how this feature is used.
Resources
We have curated some resources to help you get started with the tool.