Retain Teacher sub-prompts in Discussions

[khargrove]

When providing a Discussions prompt for assessment, I usually ask my students to reply to one of several sub-prompts. For example, I might announce a general topic in my RCE Instructions, but then ask students to reply to one of several, more focused sub-prompt options I've posted to the discussion so they have choice. Or, I might list several sources the class reviewed that module (reading, website, video, lecture, etc.) in the RCE info, but ask students to only comment on one of the resources below in the actual discussion. For now, these sub-prompts were merely discussion posts I had to remember to make at the start of each term as a Teacher..

It would be nice if Canvas could retain these Teacher-role drafted sub-prompts from term to term when a course is copied. This way, the Teacher doesn't have to go in by hand each term and add all the sub-prompts in; they could also migrate along with the main RCE instructions. I'd love to see this feature branded as "signposts" to help guide students through Discussions; the feature could be activated with a checkbox and via Canvas role permissions.. The signpost feature would also benefit students if you've assigned several students/a group to moderate a module discussion so the moderator-led posts stand out..

Thanks for the consideration, Canvas!

[lshulman]

I used to do this when we were using Blackboard. Blackboard had an option, when copying courses, to include "discussion starters" (top level thread posts).

What I do in Canvas to accomplish the same idea is to post several questions for response in the discussion directions. Then student select any one question they want to reply to. I include a "question title" and ask students to include this as the first line in their posts to make it easier to see what question option they are discussing even if the posts are "collapsed".