Challenge: Make students ask in communities and not direct messages to teachers

Why?

• It’s only possible to learn from others if you see what they ask
• Answerring repitive questions is time-consuming and demotivating for the teachers

Another contradiction;

you want as many questions as possible in the open community, but students feel more comfortable in direct messages.

Think about

1. Has the safe place been established?

   First of all, understand which phase you and the student are in. If you are still establishing the safe place for the students, answer the question. See Make everyone feel welcome

2. Sensitive topic or question relevant for just one student?

   Is the question only relevant to this single student or is the questions sensitive?

   If yes, it's OK to answer in a direct message. If no, move on

3. How to direct the question to the community?

   If you don't see any obvious reason the question should not be directed to the community, then its probably the right thing to do. Be supportive to the student, but say they will most likely get the best and fastest answer if you ask the community.

   Ask if the student would like to post him/herself or if its better that you ask on their behalf.

4. Did the student get the issue fixed?

   Even if you post on their behalf and some students answer, don't let go until you get a confirmation that the student has seen the answer. It's best practice to follow-up the student asking with a direct message when it's solved.

5. How to train the student for the next question?

   You don't want to be stuck as the middleman forever. So how to train the student?

   Supporting the student and give him/her a good experience will take you a long way. But also make sure to tell "this is how you can do it yourself". If the community has a chatbot, its possible to direct the student here. but preferably you want the activity in the community.

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