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Alternatives to discussion boards in large asynchronous online courses?

In our May “how can we help you?” thread, a reader asks:

What do folks suggest as alternatives to discussion board posts in large, asynchronous online courses? I’m teaching a large intro ethics online in the fall, and I used to do discussion posts as part of that course, prior to the rise of AI. I’m moving towards doing only in-class work in all my other (in-person) courses, but I’m left with little options for reasonable course engagement activities for the online course. Any suggestions of activities which are low-stakes and AI-resistant are appreciated!

Do readers have any helpful tips?

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8 responses to “Alternatives to discussion boards in large asynchronous online courses?”

  1. Michel

    I don’t have any good suggestions; it’s been a disaster, and even the students–the few not using ChatGPT to generate comments–are sick of seeing ChatGPT comments.

    I’ve entirely abandoned them in my online courses, because it’s just not working, and it’s a huge drain, and completely demoralizing. I temporarily replaced them with a synchronous oral quiz, which worked fairly well, but obviously doesn’t replicate any of what we used the discussion forum to do.

    The only exception is my logic class, where I’ve kept them as a means for students to check in regularly and ask me questions about the material. There are a lot of ChatGPT ‘everything is going great, easy week’ comments (this is absolutely false, given the scores on in-person exams), but a lot less than in the other courses. Most of the comments are still genuine questions.

    Reply
  2. Anonymous

    One thing I’ve done is use discussion boards for students to post a quote from the reading that stood out to them. This has them practice citation skills ideally and is less tempting for AI use since I’m not asking for output from them but a quote from the text. You can then ask them about why it stood out to them in synchronous settings.

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  3. Anonymous

    There is no alternative for online courses. With AI, the entire thing is compromised. This is not a fault ofus as educators, but of the university. The university would rather make money doing online courses than not, even if it means most use AI to cheat.

    What I recommend you do is start thinking about the students interested in the course and how you can best benefit them rather than spending your time thinking about how to stop students not interested in the course from cheating. At this point we have no good ways around this as educators. In focusing on those students actually interested, discussion boards still seem to be the best way for peer-to-peer engagement and I still find students saying they enjoy talking to others about the topics via discussion boards for online courses.

    Reply
    1. Anonymous

      A agree that focusing on the students who want to learn is the right move. And that students appreciate hearing others’ ideas in discussion boards. That was especially true in my Philosophy of Religion class: several end-of-year reflection assignments pointed to it as something they especially enjoyed.

      Reply
  4. Anonymous

    Sometimes, I require discussion posts to include a quote from the reading and a response to a very specific thing in the lectures. That combo makes it harder to fake with AI. Then I only grade the discussions for completion, and full points requires two meaningful responses to other students’ posts. It isn’t foolproof, but the fools who use AI will lose out in the long run. I don’t see my role as instructor as being a cop or internet security agent. That said, posts that are obviously AI get zeros and a warning. I just don’t feel responsible to ensure that no one is getting away with it.

    Reply
  5. Anonymous

    I have students do responses rather than discussion boards and require that the responses be written in a lockdown browser. Obviously can still be cheated but it is at least a deterrent.

    I am also currently experimenting with “video group discussions” where students are assigned groups that must record a live discussion on zoom with pre-submitted questions. I will try and remember to reply to my comment after those occur and I can say how they went.

    Reply
  6. Will

    I have experimented with sorting students into discussion groups which meet weekly and having them record themselves talking about the assigned reading. Groups were between three and four students, and I asked each student to prepare one substantive question and one objection about our weekly readings and present them to the group for discussion. I told them to aim for between 15 and 30 minute meetings.

    The assignment is not AI-proof (nothing in an asynchronous online course is) since the students can use LLMs to generate their prepared question/objection, but it is much harder to phone in participation in the discussion when it is happening in real-time on a call with your classmates. At the very least I did not get the sense that they were faking/outsourcing their reactions to other students’ questions. At times they would get quite animated and it seemed like they often had fun. I think they appreciated the chance to meet other students in the course: they get lonely in these asynchronous classes, too!

    Discussions were graded pass/fail but I scrubbed through them and left short comments to let them know I was paying attention. If they got too off topic or distracted I would tell them so. FWIW several students explicitly mentioned a preference for this model over discussion boards in their evaluations.

    Reply
  7. Anonymous

    It might be worth trying to use a tool like VoiceThread. I haven’t myself used it in any online classes yet so I can’t fully endorse it, but I’ve heard good things. It’s an app you can embed in Canvas assignments where students have to upload audio recordings (or audio + video, if preferred). You can set it up so students can listen to one another’s audio recordings and respond to them. It’s supposed to mimic a live discussion. In theory, a student could use AI to make a “script” for their initial comment, but if you require them to respond to one another I don’t think they could use AI for the entire assignment.

    Reply

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