Some TWT FIG members expressed their discussion boards never received too much activity or the responses were a few words and did not reflect true student engagement with each other as well as the course content.  Two FIG members showed us their discussion boards and shared how they use discussion board for their classes.  Some of the ways included:

1. as a way to get students to read.  Students are asked to read and then write a response based on what they read as well as respond to another student.
2. as a means to have students apply what they have learned to real life situations. By doing so, this makes learning more meaningful to students.
3. watch a short video followed by either a question or a reflection.
4. for writing assignments, a discussion board can be used to have students practice writing, write and gather their thoughts and prepare for a final assignment

All the discussion boards that were shown worked well because they have very specific prompts.  Students knew what they were expected to write about, the length of the response and time frame to complete the posts.