[Discussions] See all of a student's posts together

[david8]

In order to assess and grade a student on participation in the discussion boards, it would be helpful to be able to see all of that student's posts aggregated on a single page.

• Of course the replies will be out of context, but that would still be helpful, especially if there were a "see in context" button on each response by the student.
• It would be helpful if each post came with the basic metadata, including the subject of the thread in which it was embedded if it's a response
• As an option, perhaps one could filter these to see only the top level posts by any particular student. 

[david8]

Thanks, Kelley. That looks like the view I'm asking for. But from what I can tell from poking around at speed grading, it only shows items that are being graded, and I am not grading the posts individually. Their participation in the discussion is a component of their grade (note: I hereby declare my hatred of grades) but the posts are not themselves graded. That seems to mean that they don't show up in the speed grade view. 

[david8]

You are projecting correctly, Laura

[laurakgibbs]

Oh, that is a great point also,  @thompsli ‌, so thanks for sharing that here! My understanding is that when Canvas is looking at feature ideas to develop, they are interested in all the different use scenarios, so that is a good one to think about too.

[1086095]

The need for this has come up for our instructors who would like to see overall effort in the discussion forums. Many of our classes are face-to-face and activity in the online discussion forums is often just one part of their overall participation grade in a class. Having to make each forum graded and looking through each post can be time consuming, especially in large enrollment courses.

[tug84345]

cosigning on the need for a way to count number of posts. There is also a feature request for this: https://community.canvaslms.com/ideas/7990-more-discussion-information-within-grading-area

[ebender1]

I'm working on writing a letter of recommendation for a student who was very quiet in class.  I'd like to see what they contributed to class discussions online, so I use that as a basis (hopefully) to say that they have insightful things to say, think deeply about the material, etc.  I'm utterly shocked that Canvas doesn't have this functionality. 

When I go the discussions page, it suggests that it should be possible to search posts by author, but then that doesn't work.

[1086095]

Supporting this feature idea and commenting on behalf of one of our instructors:

Please increase the limit that has been placed on the number of posts in the People section of the website. This is currently set at 10 (the most recent 10). Why can't the full number of posts be retrieved? This would be a way for the instructor to double check the tally she gets from the Engagement Index and also a quick way to review all the posts that each student has done over the semester. This would be much better than going into the week by week record and having to track the posts of each student over the term. If the default can't be changed, then at least there could be an option for the professor to choose to see "all" of the posts a student has done over the term.

[dhalfmann]

I support this idea, but wanted to mention a workaround: designate all discussions as "graded" (with 0 points if you wish) and then on the individual view of the student's grades select "show details".  This will show all of the discussions in which the student participated.  When you click on the link for each discussion you will see that student's contribution to the discussion. 

[cholling]

good work-around and one I'd never thought of -- thanks!

[tgrochowski]

This is a neat workaround, Drew, but I think Paula's suggestion is terrific and what is needed.  I don't want the students to have their own "gradebook" cluttered with items that are not being scored.  I'd also like to note that you still have to click on each discussion separately when you look at the person's grade items.  That's the same as searching for a student's posts in an individual discussion. Maybe it saves a step.  It would be easier to have access to every single discussion post by each student, and not have the limits of "recent messages."  Maybe instructors can set those restrictions, the way you can change the parameters of your search in an online banking app or site. (When you want to find a bank transaction from six weeks ago, instead of the last thirty days, you can adjust the time range to go back to six weeks ago. Why can't we do that in Canvas?) 

The parallel function in Blackboard was "Performance Dashboard," which allowed me to see every post from a student on one page.