Online Discussions > Formatting Content for Printing

Instuctors will often want to print the entire content of a thread or series of threads for reading offline. If a user attempts to print from the main course site view of the Discussion Forum this will create problems, due to the Blackboard frames layout. To format the content of a discussion forum for printing follow these steps:

1 - Login to your course site.

2 - Right Click on the navigation button labeled "Discussion Board" and select the option "Open in New Window"

3 - The list of Discussion Forums will open in a new browser window. Browse to the forum in question. Click on the tab labeled "show options" to open up access to the administrative control panel.

4 - Place checkmarks in the boxes next to the messages that you wish to print and then press the button labeled "Collect".

5 - Use the File>Print menu to print the list of messages.

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Related FAQ's

Q: How can I encourage student participation?

1 - Allow participation in threaded discussions to be used as a portion of a student's participation grade (in-class participation and on-line participation being weighted somewhat equally).

2 - Post an interactive assignment in a discussion forum and provide guidelines as to what you would like to see in the postings; encourage students to read/respond to each other's posts.

3 - Early in the semester participate actively by picking out a few good posts and respond to them yourself to let students know that you are actively reading messages in these forums.

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