Overview

This guide provides information about setting up discussions that are divided by learner groups (such as cohorts or enrolment tracks) within your course on the Xen Learning Portal.

What Are Divided Discussions?

With divided discussions, discussion topics are visible to all learners, but the posts, responses, and comments within these topics are grouped so that learners interact only with members of their assigned group (either the same cohort or the same enrolment track).

Note: You can only divide discussions by one type of group (either cohorts or enrolment tracks), even if your course uses both.

For example, if you divide discussions based on enrolment tracks such as "Free" and "Certificate" and specify that a course-wide discussion topic called "Assignments" is divided, all learners see the topic, but:

• Learners in the "Free" track interact only with posts, responses, and comments from other learners in the "Free" track.

• Learners in the "Certificate" track interact only with posts, responses, and comments from learners in the "Certificate" track.

Topics not marked as divided remain unified, meaning all learners in the course can see and respond to posts, responses, and comments from any other learner in the course.

Best Practices for Divided Discussions

1. Use Clear Naming Conventions: Adopt a naming convention for discussion topics to make the intended audience clear to learners before they post (e.g., "[Certificate Track] Assignment Help").

2. Assign Moderation Roles: You can appoint learners as Group Moderators to help manage discussions. Group Moderators can only see and respond to posts from learners in their assigned group.

3. Test Your Course: Use the "View As" functionality in the Learning Portal to verify that learners in each group see the correct discussion topics and posts.

Example: Dividing Discussion Topics Based on Enrolment Track

Course-Wide Discussion Topics

Suppose your course includes the following course-wide discussion topics:

• General

• Course Announcements

• Assignment FAQs

• Final Project Ideas

You decide that:

• "General" and "Course Announcements" will remain unified because their content is relevant to all learners.

• "Assignment FAQs" and "Final Project Ideas" will be divided by enrolment track because assignments and final projects differ for "Free" and "Certificate" tracks.

In this setup:

• Learners in the "Free" track interact with "Assignment FAQs" and "Final Project Ideas" discussions within their group.

• Learners in the "Certificate" track do the same within their own group.

Content-Specific Discussion Topics

For content-specific discussions, you use access settings to ensure that learners in each enrolment track see only the discussions tied to their content:

• Add separate discussion components for each group and configure visibility accordingly.

Setting Up Divided Discussions

Important: Divided discussions must be configured before the course starts. Changes after the course begins may disrupt the learner experience, making some posts visible or invisible unexpectedly.

1. Navigate to the Instructor Dashboard and select Discussions.

2. Under Group Settings, select the group type for dividing discussions (e.g., cohorts or enrolment tracks).

3. Save your selection.

Specifying the Group Type for Dividing Discussions

To configure group-based discussions:

1. Open the Instructor Dashboard and go to Discussions.

2. Save your changes. This setting applies to both course-wide and content-specific discussion topics.

Specifying Which Course-Wide Discussion Topics Are Divided

When creating course-wide discussion topics, they are unified by default. You can specify which topics to divide:

1. In the Instructor Dashboard, go to Discussions.

2. Under Course-Wide Discussion Topics, check the box next to topics you want to divide. Uncheck boxes for unified topics.

3. Save your changes.

Divided topics now restrict interactions to learners in their assigned groups.

Content-Specific Discussion Topics and Groups

When adding content-specific discussions:

• By default, these topics are unified.

• You can configure them to be divided for group-specific interactions.

Specify that All Content-Specific Discussion Topics Are Divided

To make all content-specific discussions divided:

1. Go to Discussions in the Instructor Dashboard.

2. Under Content-Specific Discussion Topics, select Always Divide Content-Specific Topics.

3. Save your changes.

Specify That Some Content-Specific Discussion Topics Are Divided

To divide only selected topics:

1. Go to Discussions in the Instructor Dashboard.

2. Under Content-Specific Discussion Topics, select Divide Selected Topics.

3. Check the boxes for topics to divide.

4. Save your changes.