Student Guide: Ed Discussion
What Is Ed Discussion (ED)?
- Ed Discussion is a discussion platform where students, TAs, and instructors engage in threaded discussions. It supports collaborative features like code execution, video embedding, image annotation, and document sharing.
- You can post questions anonymously, visible only to the instructor. The platform offers various filtering options: favoriting threads, sorting by recency, or categorizing, like viewing all lecture-related queries. Additionally, the board is searchable for convenience.
How to Use ED
You will need the following before you can complete this task:
- You will need access to Canvas.
- If you are using Ed Discussion in a course that does not use Canvas, you may log in with your Penn email address at https://edstem.org/us/login.
If your instructor enabled ED, you would be able to access ED from the course menu.
Guide to Understanding Thread Icons in ED:
-
Blue Dot
: Represents unread threads that you haven't viewed yet.
-
Green Check
: Denotes questions that have been resolved or answered.
-
Purple Pin
: These threads are pinned to the top for more visibility, typically for announcements or critical information. Only instructors can pin threads.
-
Blue Ribbon
: Threads that have been endorsed by course instructors, signifying high-quality content.
-
Heart
: Indicates agreement. Hearts remain anonymous and don't reveal who clicked them.
-
Star
: Threads you've bookmarked for future reference. These bookmarks are private to you.
-
Eye Icon
: Threads you've subscribed to, meaning you'll receive email notifications for thread activity.
-
"S" Icon
: Shows a student has provided an answer in the thread.
-
"I" Icon
: Indicates an instructor responded to the thread.