What is Discussion Hero?
Discussion Hero is a Canvas tool developed at Northwestern University that provides an entertaining and engaging game-style approach to participating in discussion boards. The philosophy behind Discussion Hero is that online discussion boards can be made more productive by leveraging game-style formats that encourage diverse points of view, questioning, and respectful debate and dialogue. Through the use of hero and villain avatars, Discussion Hero builds upon the role-play genre. It uses traditional awarding of points with a game-like progress meter that is generated by a customizable rating rubric. This progress meter allows students to see how they are performing on their discussion posts in real-time and provides an incentive to view participation as healthy competition.
How Does It Work?
Discussion Hero is designed to put participants into two distinct roles in the discussion forums: Heroes and Villains. Student participants choose which role they want on a first come, first serve basis. Once they make the selection, a unique avatar is also chosen. They then participate as they normally would in a discussion, with criteria set up by the teacher that students must meet. The criteria may be related to students as assignment instructions, or via a rubric. Teachers select topics and design prompts that provide an opportunity for students to take positions they may agree or disagree with. Students must think critically about the subject matter. By citing literature, and using graphics and media as well as embedded web sites within their posts, students defend their arguments with exciting and easy-to-use features. Discussion Hero also provides for manual or automated grading based on teacher customized rubrics. Heroes and Villains compete in a respectful and engaging way either as individuals or in teams.
Why Use Discussion Hero?
Discussion Boards in online courses and trainings can be hit or miss, even when instructors design carefully worded prompts. While discussion boards are often meant for vigorous discourse and a variety of opinions and positions, some students simply do not want to go against the majority and always tend to agree even if they do not feel the same way. Discussion Hero was designed to apply a growing body of evidence that game-style environments don't only belong in video games and mobile learning apps, but can also be used effectively in online courses, both at the undergraduate and graduate level.
Discussion hero also allows students and teachers to use powerful online discussion features not readily available in the standard Canvas discussion board. These features include:
- Optional anonymous posting.
- The ability to drag and drop image files directly into a discussion post.
- The ability to drag and drop audio and video files (file size limited) directly into a discussion post.
- The ability to embed web page previews and hyperlinks directly into discussion posts.
- A customizable rating rubric.
- Automated or manual grade entry.
Testimonials
Student Responses
How did assuming a hero or villain role affect the comments you made?
“As a hero, I felt the need to consistently defend my points against counter-arguments.”
Why did you choose to be a villain?
“I like to be a little wicked sometimes.”
What surprised you about Discussion Hero?
“It was harder to take a different perspective than others had already taken. It was even harder to stay on ‘the other side’ of an issue.”
How Did Discussion Hero Start?
Discussion Hero was developed as a collaborative effort between Northwestern’s School of Professional Studies (Jacob Guerra-Martinez and David Noffs) and Northwestern's Information Technology Services & Support Teaching & Learning Technologies (Jacob Collins). The project was supported in part by the Provost's Digital Learning Fellowship. It was designed as an LTI (Learning Tools Interoperability) app to be compatible with Northwestern’s educational platform, Instructure Canvas. Canvas is a software application that distributes online or blended courses over the Internet with features for managing training and educational records, and online collaboration.
Meet the Developers
Jake Collins, Senior Software Developer, NUIT
Jacob Collins is a senior software developer at Northwestern University in the Teaching and Learning Technologies department. He has written a wide range of academic and research applications in this position such as Nebula and Discussion Hero, as well as other applications including learning analytics, learning interface design, and 17th century text analysis using machine learning. He holds a degree in Computer Science from Purdue University along with Mechanical Engineering and Management degrees.
Jacob Martinez, Learning Designer, SPS Distance Learning
Jacob-Guerra Martinez is currently a Learning Designer at Northwestern University, where he develops online courses for the School of Professional Studies. Prior to that he was a Special Education Teacher for five years, where he taught high-school students with learning disabilities in the subjects of Math, Computers, and English. He graduated with a Bachelor’s degree in Radio-Television-Film from the University of Texas at Austin, and then went on to earn a Master’s degree in Computer Education and Cognitive Systems from the University of North Texas.
David Noffs, Lecturer and Learning Designer, SPS Distance Learning
David Sharrard Noffs is a Lecturer and Learning Designer and faculty member at Northwestern University’s School of Professional Studies. Prior to that he was was the Instructional Specialist and Learning Management System Administrator at Columbia College Chicago for ten years. His doctoral dissertation in Adult and Continuing Education from National Louis University is entitled “Resonating Frequencies of a Virtual Learning Community: An Ethnographic Case Study of Online Faculty Development at Columbia College Chicago.”
Patricia Chrastka, Learning Interaction Designer, SPS Distance Learning
Patty Chrastka is a Learning Interaction Designer at Northwestern's School of Professional Studies. First hired as a Multimedia Coordinator back in 2012, her role within Distance Learning has evolved along with the current demands of online learning. She has been attached to such projects as Northwestern’s MOOC program to lead the development of the first Distance Learning Website and other innovative projects. In July 2018, she received the new title of Learning Interface Designer. Currently, she offers technology support for faculty during the course development cycle while offering graphic design and basic front-end skills to improve content delivery to students.
Special Thanks
In addition to the support received from the Office of the Provost and Faculty Support Services team, the project team wishes to thank Reba-Anna Lee, Dan Murphy, Christine Scherer, Dan Pattley, Reggie Jackson, Matthew Aron, and Victoria Getis. We must also thank a couple of people who are no longer at Northwestern who helped along the way. Kelly Roark and Heather Haseley from the Faculty Support Services team were a great support to our work when it was just an idea.
Learn More
To find out more about Discussion Hero and stay up to date on developments, visit the Northwestern Discussion Hero and Nebula2 blog page. To receive an instructor guide, learn how you can add it to your online class discussions, or to be added to our Discussion Hero mailing list, contact Dr Reba-Anna Lee or Dan Murphy at discussionhero@northwestern.edu. If you are not a part of the Northwestern Community, please let us know, and we can send you the latest information on our efforts to make Discussion Hero an open-source resource for other institutions.
Install Discussion Hero at Northwestern
If you are an instructor at Northwestern and want to add Discussion Hero to your course, go to the Northwestern Learning Apps website and click on the Install Discussion Hero purple button. You will be directed to Canvas to choose your desired course from the Choose Course pull down menu. Follow the on-screen instructions to install and setup Discussion Hero in your course.
Install Discussion Hero at Other Institutions
An open-source version of Discussion Hero is availble for installation on any school's Canvas instance. See the Discussion Hero Open-Source Installation page.
