View discussion topics and responses

Updated 17 Aug 2021

To manage your discussions, you can read responses one at a time, use Expand All to show them all at once, mark responses as read or unread, and sort by author, date, or read/unread. A blue circle unread icon indicates unread and an empty circle read icon means you read a response.

The Topics list shows at a glance the total number of responses and the number unread for each topic. If you do not want you or students to see this count, clear the check mark for Display number of responses for a topic in the course-level Discussions Settings.

Icons appear below response dates for posts that include file attachments attachments icon, or media embed media icon.

You can scan the first sentence or two of responses without expanding them to see what is discussed if you select the Display Threaded Discussion responses in “Preview” mode option in Discussions Settings. Select Show More to see the complete post.

Note: To view student responses to any “Post first” topic you need to switch to Manage mode, or you can respond to the topic yourself to see all responses in View mode. You'll know if students responded to a "Post first" topic by scanning the total and unread response count in the Topics list.

  1. Open the discussion menu item.
  2. Select a topic title under Topics.
  3. For Sort by, select one of the following:
    •  Read/Unread — Shows all responses you have either read or not opened.
    •  Date— Sorts responses by the date and time they were posted.
    •  Name — Sorts responses by last name.

    •  Reset — Returns the sort to the default response order.

  4. You can sort the list by the Questions or Recommendations tabs (if shown), or select the Discussions tab to see all responses to the topic.
  5. Enter a keyword in Search  to highlight where the word appears within posts for the topic.
  • Select  to mark it as read.
  • Select  to mark it as unread.
  • To mark all posts as read or unread, select More then choose either Mark all as read or Mark all as unread.

This keyword search is limited to one topic and does not include results from other topics.

To search within a discussion topic:

  1. Open the discussion menu item.
  2. Select a topic title under Topics.
  3. Enter a keyword in Search then select search topic icon.

    The keyword is highlighted where it appears within all posts and responses for the topic.

    1. Select the topic you want to print under Topics.
    2. Select the Print icon .

      The topic prints, including all its responses.

    Note: Some browsers do not support this feature.

See also:

Respond to a discussion topic