There are several types of forums available in Moodle. This guide will explain the types of forums and how to setup a Standard forum for general usewith features that are commonly used including attachments.
Types of forums
News forum
- Located in the first section of the middle column.
- Used for general announcement postings by the teacher. Only the teacher can access general announcement postings for editing.
- Automatically generates an email to all participants after 30 minutes.
A single simple discussion
- Used for short focused discussions.
Each person posts one discussion
- Each person may start one discussion.
- Everyone may reply to posted discussions.
Q and A forum
- Participants post an initial discussion in the form of a question
- Participant must reply to a posted question before they see replies from other participants.
Standard forum for general use
- General purpose forum where anyone may start a new topic.
Standard forum displayed in a blog-like format
- Similar to Standard forum for general useexcept formatting resembles a blog.
To create a forum
- Click Turn editing on.
- In the desired topic/week, click Add an activity or resource.
- Select Forum from the Activities list → Add.
- Complete the desired fields, noting the following:
- Forum name – The forum name as it will appear on the Moodle course.
- Description– Used to provide participants with guidelines for the forum.
- Forum type– Determines the way the forum functions.
- Other settings include attachments, tracking and limiting time to post.
- Click Save and return to course.
- Remember to post to the forum or students will not be able to post.
To post to a forum
- Click the forum title on the course page.
- Click Add a new discussion topic.
- In the Your new discussion topicsection, complete the Subjectand Message fields.
- To add an attachment, drag and drop the desired files into the designated area or click the icon of a file with a plus sign to open the file picker.
- Click Post to forum.
Updated: 3/5/2021
