Last Wednesday, June 11, Educational Technology published a brief article titled "15 Essential Netiquette Guidelines to Share with Your Students." It caught our eye right away as it featured a graphic that is similar to one of our most popular poster templates. It also included a thorough infographic from Touro College's Online Education Department. This sort of in-depth infographic would be great to send to your students before launching any sort of online-based learning community such as a message board or online forum.
We also see the value in displaying a large poster like this VariQuest template reminding students of basic etiquette before texting, posting, tweeting, etc. THINK: Is it true? Is it helpful? Is it inspiring? Is it necessary? Is it kind?
Here is a quick round-up of these 15 netiquette rules written by Educational Technology (click here for the full article and infographic):
- Before posting your question to a discussion board, check if anyone has asked it already and received a reply.
- Stay on topic. Don't post irrelevant links, comments, thoughts or pictures.
- Don't type in ALL CAPS! If you do it will look like you are screaming.
- Don't write anything that sounds angry or sarcastic even as a joke, because without hearing your tone of voice, your peers might not realize you're joking.
- Always remember to say"please" and "thank you" when soliciting help from your classmates.
- Respect the opinion of your classmates. If you feel the need to disagree, do so respectfully and acknowledge the valid points in your classmate's argument. If you reply to a question from a classmate, make sure your answer is accurate!
- If you ask questions , many people respond. Summarize all answers and post that summary to benefit your whole class.
- Be brief. If you write a long dissertation in response to a simple question, it's unlikely that anyone will spend the time to read through it all.
- Don't badmouth others or call them stupid. You may disagree with their ideas but don't mock the person.
- If you refer to something your classmate said earlier in the discussion, quote just a few key lines from their post so that others won't have to go back and figure out which post you're referring to.
- Before asking a question, check the class FAQs or search the Internet to see if the answer is obvious or easy to find.
- Check the most recent comments before you reply to an older comment.
- Be forgiving. If your classmate makes a mistake, don't badger him or her for it. Just let it go.
- Run a spelling and grammar check before posting anything to the discussion board.