1. Add Discussion and Chat Icons to Homepage

1. On the homepage under Options, click on Add page or tool.

2. Click on Discussions.

3. Type in the title for this link to the Discussion tool and check on Course Menu and Organizer Page (Homepage). Choose the appearance of your link--whether it is just text or has an icon and then whether the icon is to be a standard, default photo or chosen from the larger WebCT database of other images. Click Add.

4. Repeat to order to add the Chat icon to your Homepage.

2. Create Discussion Topics

Creating the Bulletin Board is a two-step process. First you must create the topics and then you go into each topic to add a message with a detailed question or assignment for the students.

1. On the homepage, click on your Discussion tool link or icon, making certain that the Designer Options tab is forward.

 

2. Click on Create Topic. Type the Topic Name in the blank--it's best to add a date here for the day on which the topic is due so students will be less confused. Click Create.

3. Click on Topic Settings. Choose the desired settings and Update. Remember that the longer subject headings will force the author's name to the far right and you may have to scroll to do your grading unless you limit the amount of characters of the subject heading.

 

 

3. Create Discussion Messages within the Topic Bulletin Boards.

1. From the homepage, click on Discussion.

2. Click on the title of whatever topic to which you want to add information or read the messages, in order to go into that particular topic area.

 

3. Click Compose Message and fill out the form with a subject title and your question or instructions. Click on Preview and then Post.

 



4. IMPORTANT! TELL ALL STUDENTS THIS INFORMATION. Click Update Listing if you can't see your message on the Discussion Bulletin Board. If you still can't see it, try clicking on Display: All and click any green arrows so they face downwards, which opens all subsidary messages in a particular thread.

5. To read all the messages, check the box by the word, Subject, and that will fill all the message boxes with checks, or click on the appropriate selection of boxes, then click Compile.

6. To delete all the messages, check the box by the word, Subject, and that will fill all the message boxes with checks, or click on the appropriate selection of boxes, then click Delete.

7. You can also search for all of a particular student's messages with the Search button.

8. If you want to answer a specific student's message and have your answer indented under that message, click on the title of the message you want to answer. Only that message will open up and you can Reply directly to it.



**So there are two ways of putting messages in a bulletin board. Compose Message starts a new thread at the bottom of the list and Reply indents answers a thread directly under any previous message that's chosen.

4. Create Chat Groups

1. On the homepage, click on the Chat icon that you put there earlier. It may take a minute or three to load depending upon your type of connection. Click on Designer Options. You can change the chat page's appearance, give four channels group names, or view the logs of those four channels. Students won't be able to see these logs unless you copy and paste the text into an html file and post it.

 

 

2. To enter and use the chat room, click on any Room. Then type in the bottom white typing area and hit Enter or Return.

 

 

5. Link directly into WebCT Discussion and Chat from outside webpages

1. WebCT is based on frames, which means that its URL doesn't change with the different pages within WebCT. So if you want to go directly to WebCT Discussion, bypassing the WebCT Homepage, find the URL by clicking and hold (Mac) and choose New Window with This Frame or right-clicking Open Frame in New Window (PC) to open up any page without frames. The new URL should be something like: http://webteach.csun.edu:31399/SCRIPT/Art305_10518_F00/scripts/student/serve_bulletin?FORUM1++++

But with your course ID in place of Art305_10518_F00

2. Find the question mark in the URL, strip away the question mark and any text to the right of it from the URL. So that only this is left: http://hp9k1.csun.edu:31337/SCRIPT/Art305_10518_F00/scripts/student/serve _bulletin

3. Hit return. This will be the full URL with working links, which you can copy and paste as a link into your outside webpages.

Return to WebCT Instructions

by ccheal © 2003