Assessment in the Discussion Forum

The Forum database automatically collects certain usage statistics to which you have access. They are available to instructors (not to students) by clicking on the Assessment link in the right side of the footer.

Note: These assessment features are not sophisticated statistical tools. They are meant to give an overview of the nature of Forum use that could point to interesting areas for further quantitative and/or qualitative research.

Assessment Functions and Descriptions:

Entries by Hour: A graphical representation of relative activity during the day. It is comprised by taking an average of all entries by hour, regardless of day.

Entries by Day: A graphical representation of relative activity by day of the week. It is comprised by taking an average of all entries by day, regardless of week.

Entry Chronology: A graph showing the number of entries for each day of forum operation.

Thread Analysis: A tabular analysis of the nature of the discussion and relative effectiveness of certain threads with the following statistics:

-total threads

-total responses

-average responses per thread

-maximum responses to a thread

-maximum depth of a thread (responses to responses to…)

-number of student-initiated threads

-number of student threads with no responses

-number of instructor-initiated threads

-number of instructor threads with no responses.

Participation: Number of entries (threads or responses) per participant per day.

Forum Scores: Table listing instructor-given scores to student postings on a weekly basis.

Note: Giving more than one score per week will not work with a letter grade system. When a numbering system is used, it is additive. That is, if you assign more than one grade per week, the scores will be added (not averaged) as will the totals in the right-most column.

Assignment Scores: Table listing scores of each graded assignment. There are subtotals by assignment (sums all student grades) as well as a total sum (not average) for all assignments. (Obviously, scores will not sum if you are using a letter grade scale.)

General Statistics: A tabular list of all entries by team, by common area, and by instructor. Also shown are the number of entries for each participant, for individual teams, for the common area, and for instructors; the distribution of entries - number of threads versus number of responses; average word count of messages plus word count totals for each participant; and scores for each entry. Each of these statistics is also subtotaled by participant, team, common area, and instructor, where applicable.