@LoraCohn ...
I am sorry that you didn't find my reply helpful. I did try to answer your first question about wanting the original Discussion interface back by giving you some resources related to the enforcement of the Discussions/Announcements Redesign.
1. Having to click on reply to see student replies to each other is a waste of time-- I just want every posting from every student to be exposed all the time. How do I make that happen?
In the new Discussion interface, are you clicking on the "Expand Threads" button at the top of your topic? This will expand everything so that you aren't having to click on an individual response from a student to see more responses to that student. (Note, the "Expand Threads" button changes to "Collapse Threads" when all threads are visible on your screen.)
2. In the past, I've been able to get to speed grader from the discussion thread itself. How do I do that in the new design?
You can still do this (assuming this is a graded discussion). When you click on a discussion topic to view the replies, at the top right corner of the discussion topic, click on the three-dot kebab icon. You should see an option to "Open in SpeedGrader".
3. What does this mean (below)? How do I know when the post I am viewing was created? Is it the first day/time or the last day/time or some other day/time?
Student name
Jun 13 11:30pmLast reply Jun 16 3:37pm
This is covered in the Guide: How do I view and sort discussion replies in Discu... - Instructure Community - 469513 (canvaslms.co.... Look at the section "View Replies" where it describes what these dates and times mean. I've copied the text for you here:
In discussion replies, you can view the name of the user who posted the reply [1], the date and time their reply was posted [2], and the date and time the last threaded reply was posted [3].
4. When discussions are designated as a group discussion, how do I type in one response to everyone and one grade for everyone? I am pretty sure I was able to do this in the past but can't now.
When you have a group discussion for a particular topic, you are first setting up a Group Set. You can name this Group Set the same as your assignment name to keep things simple. (I like to do this via the "People" page, by the way.) Then, within the Group Set that you created, you can create your groups. For example, you might have "Green Team", "Blue Team", "Red Team", and "Yellow Team". You then put students into each of those teams. When creating the discussion topic, you specify that it is a group discussion, and then you choose the specific Group Set that you created via the "People" page. Canvas will do the leg work in making sure that when students respond to the topic, they are only responding in their own group for that topic and not a different group. Students don't see a general discussion topic, but they do see their own group discussion topic. So, when you click on the topic as an instructor, you do see an area to reply, but it's not a part of any of the groups within the Group Set. Students would not see a reply in that area. You would need to post the reply in each of the groups...which you can access easily within the discussion topic by clicking on the icon of two people at the top left corner (next to the "Search entries or author..." text box).
5. How do I get out of a group discussion when I am ready to return to the other course items? I can get to the other groups easily but can't get back to the whole class with ease.
Yeah...this is one of my frustrations, too. There are a few options...none of which are a single click...
- Use your browser's "Back" button multiple times until you are back in your course.
- Use the breadcrumb trail at the top left corner of the group discussion. It will say something like: GroupName > Discussions > TopicName GroupName (of course, your names will be filled in here..as I was just providing generic names).
- Use your "Courses" navigation button in your left-hand global navigation menu to return to your course.
- Create a "favorite" within your course for the overall discussion page. That way, you can easily click on your saved "favorite" to return to the discussion topic whenever you want.
I hope I've covered most of your questions and that the information I've provided has been helpful. Sing out if you have further questions about this...thanks!
