How to Use Discussions for Journaling

Creating groups of one and giving each group of one its own space in the Discussions tool, effectively creates a space for student to use as a journal in which only the student and instructor(s) can view the posts. Follow these steps to set up the journals in Discussions.

1. In your Nav Bar, under Course Tools or More, select Groups (You can also find the Groups tool in Course Admin).

2. On the Manage Groups screen, click New Category.
3. Fill in the Category Name (required) and Description (optional) for the category.
4. Under the Enrollment Type, select the Single-User Member Specific Groups option.

5. Under Additional Options section, click Set Up Discussion Areas.
6. Either select an existing Forum or create a New Forum.
7. Click Save.

8. Click Create one topic per group or Create onetopic with threads separated by group. Make a Title and Description and when finished, click Create and Next.
9. Click Done and then Save.

Now in the Discussions tool, you will see the forum (here called Journal Assignment) and either one topic for each student (as in this picture) or 

a single topic where each student would start their own thread for journal postings.

Note: Brightspace will automatically add "Group Discussion" to the end of the topic name, which you can remove by editing the topic title so students do not get confused.