Piazza is a discussion forum unlike most discussion forums I have seen before. Rather than a traditional discussion forum where individuals post a questions and then recipients respond to the question or even responses, this forum is more streamlined and remains one question and one answer. Active discussion forms can be cumbersome to follow and responses are hard to keep track of. ANGEL (the LMS that Penn State currently uses) had a discussion forum that seems particularly ‘clunky’ and students often find it difficult to participate effectively. How does Piazza do things differently? In Piazza, a question is posed that can be edited and further expanded as well by other participants. Furthermore, rather than a having numerous responses to the question, only one answer is posted as a response, an answer than can be edited and expanded on. Think of this discussion forum as a wiki discussion where both questions and answers are a collaborative effort by participants. Features are built in to allow participants to see the progression of changes in both questions and answers using a slider bar within the platform.
Piazza has dedicated an entire web page to features.
Students can not only post questions to a class, but could also just add information as notes. Notes don’t require any kind of response, but other participants can still edit and enhance notes created by other students.
While the design of Piazza allows students to tap into classmates knowledge and insight, students can post questions that are just viewable by instructors.
Students can also post polls to the class. Preferences are available when to show responses and also who chose what response.
Instructors can encourage students to use this forum to get answers from others in the class besides the instructor. Instructors can monitor responses and choose to answer questions that get attention or jump in when answers need more clarification. There is an indicator for a response given from an instructor. For especially large courses, participants may be able to answer questions, preventing instructors having to answer all questions. In addition, when instructors respond, it is possible for all students to benefit from answers.
Instructors have the option of ‘endorsing’ good questions. This is an indicator to students that these questions/notes are important and relevant to the coure.
Instructors can get a good idea of who is answering and asking questions by looking at participation reports. Students that are particularly skilled in answering questions can be identified and might be a potential teaching assistant resource. Participation in this forum greatly encourages engagement in the course.
Piazza highlights several reasons why this type of discussion forum works:
- Students contribute to the content! Anyone can ask and answer questions. Conversations can continue outside of class or all hours of the day. Even the shy or apprehensive students can feel comfortable to post questions or answer posts.
- Wiki-style Q&A makes finding answers easy! The response ends up being one answer, with potentially collaborative input on the best answer. Students won’t need to sift through many strings of answers to find the ‘best’ answer.
- Piazza updates continuously so answers and questions can be seen in ‘real time’. Students can leave a browser window open with their question and see answers evolve all evening long!
- Piazza has mobile apps on iOS and Android so that participants can keep connected with the discussions on the go. Notifications can be set up to meet participant preference.
- Classes can become student-driven with instructor control. Instructor input is easily identified and instructors can encourage students with endorsing quality post content.
- Other resources, such as syllabus, announcements, course information and other course resources can be posted in the Piazza class allowing instructors to create a class website. Announcements can also be posted and emailed to the class for easy communication.
- Reports are kept on student participation to give instructors the ability to learn more about students in class.
- If instructors are also using a Learning Management System, integration can be incorporated with their class for seamless interaction. (Currently ANGEL does not support this integration. Blackboard and Canvas are however).
- Faculty can use polls to survey students to provide feedback on the course or particular activities. Polls can help identify confusing content or non-relevant projects. Polls can help identify where students are having the most trouble with content. Instructors can use this feedback to modify instruction and develop a better course.
I am planning on helping an instructor use Piazza in one of her courses next Spring. She is hoping that students can pose questions about cases they encounter while in their Nursing Clinical Practicum and have other students weigh in on alternative solutions or circumstances to consider. I think with the ability of multiple students modifying the answers, that responses potentially will be more high quality, complete, and thoughtful.