Arrested Pulse

The original article of this blog, "Using Internet Newsgroups to Spark Student Discussion," appeared in Teaching Matters (4:3, Feb. 1999), a publication by the Center for Effective University Teaching at Northeastern University. The audience for this blog are teachers who are interested in using technology to supplement their classes. I focus exclusively on how discussion forums can be used to enhance student communication, as well their writing skills.

I began supplementing my university English courses with online discussions when Usenet newsgroups were popular in the mid-1990s. Later I used instructional software programs (Web Course in A Box, WebCT Vista), asking students to post regularly in the discussion forums.

Online discussion groups offer a comfortable space where students can share, in writing, ideas and information relating to the course. Students can ask questions about the material or offer suggestions on assignments; they can carry on, with or without the instructor's input, discussions begun in class; and they can collaboratively brainstorm issues or problems posed by readings, the instructor, or other students.

The collaborative spirit of online discussions can also have an ice-breaking effect. Once dialogues begin, even students who are initially reticent become eager to participate; in fact, students who are shy in the classroom often have much to say in online discussions.

In addition, by providing access to students' responses to lecture material and assignments, online discussions can help instructors gauge how well they are learning. Participation keeps students actively engaged in the course outside of the classroom. It is a form of "homework" that does not require papers to be collected and returned.

My students get into the issue of ebonics
I'd now like to describe a student-initiated discussion that took place in an online forum for a freshman level English class I taught at Northeastern University in 1999. In that course students read "When Malindy Sings," a poem by Paul Laurence Dunbar written in an African-American dialect of the rural South around the turn of the century. One issue we addressed in class was how the voice of the poem's speaker, gruff and ungrammatical to the tutored ear, was rendered aesthetically appealing by Dunbar, whose elevation of a "base" language to the "high" art of poetry was not without implications.

One student, Ryan, later posted in our online forum, likening "the controversial language of ebonics" to the dialect once spoken by plantation slaves "to communicate without the slave master knowing what was being talked about." Ebonics, he implied, was misunderstood by many and indeed "should exist within ... the urban community" of black Americans. "Just as Chinese and Portuguese reflect the cultural communities of their speakers," he reasoned, "so too does ebonics reflect the culture of many African-Americans."

This drew a sharp response from David W: "This is harsh," he wrote, "so please do not be offended. Ebonics is a horrible idea, people cannot learn English properly so we invent a new language so we don't have to teach the right way to speak and write English."

When I read this, my instinct was to "correct" David by informing him that ebonics was not "invented" because people couldn't learn properly. But I had told the students that this was their group and that I would only be reading their discussions, not participating.

I'm glad I refrained from intervening because, first, being corrected online by his instructor would have humiliated David in front of his peers; and, second, Ryan--the student who brought up the topic--ended up responding to him instead, and with more couth than I probably would have mustered. "First and foremost, I am not bothered by your comments on ebonics. I'm glad you showed interest and addressed the subject."

Ryan, a black American, then noted that the attitude expressed by David, a white American, mirrored an attitude held by many black people that only "good" English (like that of Martin Luther King, Malcolm X, and Jesse Jackson) can help members of urban black communities "function within a predominantly white society."

Other students then joined the discussion, each with a different take on ebonics. Craig stressed the cultural side of the debate, comparing ebonics to the language of his parents, both Portuguese immigrants: "Since my parents used Portuguese at home, my brother and I can speak it fluently. ... It's something I want to pass onto my kids, along with my Portuguese heritage."

Another student, Jeffrey, noting that the U.S. "was built by immigrants and most of our success as a country comes from the fact that we are so culturally diverse," came out against making English the official language: "I'm not saying that ebonics should be taught in school or anything. I just don't agree with drastic measures like forcing English upon everyone. More laws, less freedom!"

Seonaid then weighed in with her idea that "[e]bonics is a form of territorial and socio-political assertion!" She argued that ebonics poses the "psycho-social bondage that white America imposes, such as the message 'if you try and talk like the rest of 'us,' maybe, just maybe you'll achieve social progress!'"

Language and culture, education and politics, ethnicity and race--all these issues evolved in threads posted by my students in online discussion without any input from me. In fact, I didn't even mention the word "ebonics" at all that semester. Their online discussion enriched the course in ways that I could not have done by traditional means.

Advice for Instructors
My experience with online discussion groups has been very positive, but there have been occasional glitches and bumps. I'd like to offer three basic suggestions for instructors interested in having their students collaborate online.

• If posting in an online discussion forum is required, don't rush students into it. Give them time to get used to the class. Once they have a "feel" of the classroom community, they will be more inclined to share their ideas in writing.
  
  
• Although well-organized, well-spelled, well-punctuated writing is expected in academic discourse, such conventions are less adhered to on the internet. Students may feel emboldened to express themselves if they know that yo won't assess their postings for "correctness."
  
  
• Students occasionally overreact and in the heat of a moment post statements that they later regret. In order to guard against this I've established a protocol that encourages students to display professional courtesy at all times in online discussions.
  
  
• Finally, students often too readily defer to the ideas and opinions of the instructor; hence, it may be helpful to limit your own participation in these discussions.
  

Of course, there is no one way to incorporate an online discussion forum in a university course. For me such forums have been effective in engaging students actively and collaboratively in the learning process. I have found them helpful, interesting, pedagogically compelling, and fun.