What's different about communication online?

My goal is to create an online community where we all treat each other with dignity. This guide is intended to be an overview of respectful interaction in our online classroom.

Have you ever sent a text message or an email that was misinterpreted by the recipient? Maybe they thought you were angry or sad when you were trying to share something funny. This kind of confusion is common in online communications, including texts, emails, discussion boards, and online classes.

The following information is intended to help you learn the norms (standards or patterns) of communication in online classes. Even if you have lots of experience with online communication in social forums, online classes are different. In an online course, your participation and engagement as a student are mostly judged by communication that occurs via text (Canvas Inbox messages, Discussion forums, etc.). Communication in an online class is more challenging because we are missing so many important cues, including body language, facial expressions, and tone of voice.

Always Start With a Greeting

Use your instructor's or classmate's preferred name or title.

Examples

Hi Jamill
Hello Professor Jones
Good morning, Sonia

Tone Down Your Language

Without all the face-to-face body language and vocal clues, written text can easily be misinterpreted. Don't use strong or offensive language and avoid the excessive use of exclamation points or capitalization. If you feel particularly strongly about a point, it may be best to write it first as a draft and then to review it, before posting it, in order to remove any strong language.

Examples

Instead of I can't believe you would say something like that, try a curious or inquisitive tone like I'm not sure what you meant when you wrote ... or When I read your post, I thought you might be saying...
Instead of I totally disagree, try I see things differently because... or In my experience, this isn't the case...

Assume Good Intentions and Own Unintended Impact

If someone states something in a discussion that you find offensive, mention this directly to the instructor. Remember that the person contributing to the discussion is also new to this class and it might have been a mistake. What you find offensive may quite possibly have been unintended and can best be cleared up by the instructor.

On the other side, you might be the person who accidentally hurts someone else. Think carefully about the content of your message before contributing it. Once sent, there is no taking it back. You may be contacted to clarify your communication if you cause harm. Be prepared to own the impact of your words, even if you had good intentions. As needed, be willing to apologize and repair relationships with others over misunderstandings.

Was That Supposed to be Funny?

Expressing humor online is really challenging. In general, it may be easiest to avoid humor and sarcasm. These frequently depend either on facial or tone of voice cues which we don't have in our online classroom.

Tips for Expressing Yourself Clearly

Messages may often appear perfectly clear to you as you compose them, but turn out to be perfectly confusing to your reader. One way to test for clarity is to read your message aloud to see if it flows smoothly. It's a good practice to compose and check your comments in a word processing tool like Microsoft Word or Google Docs before posting them.

You may be familiar with many of the previous points if you have participated in other forms of electronic communication in the past. But Web-based courses have some added constraints not present in other arenas.

Don't "Shout"

DO NOT WRITE IN ALL CAPITALS EXCESSIVELY. It is taken as yelling in discussions and is generally considered aggressive and rude.

Stick To The Point

Contributions to a discussion should have a clear subject or topic, and then you need to stick to the subject.

This Is Our Classroom

An online classroom is still a classroom, and comments that would be inappropriate in a regular classroom are likely to be inappropriate here as well. The memes and casual language used in other online forums (like social media) are generally not applicable here.

Adapted from University of Wisconsin College Courses Online.