How to Create a Forum Website for school children

[Antifragile]

Hi FLF folks, need your help... especially @MJ DeMarco

I volunteered to help a local charity, likely will take a seat on their board. Excited is an understatement for how I feel about this one.

This charity has been around for over 20 years and supplies curriculum to schools that is 100% entrepreneurship based. Yes, it is recognized and is a plug in for our typical education here and applies to grades 4 to 11. Imagine that, kids playing entrepreneurs and actually making real money doing it, while earning a grade in school.

What I think is missing is a centralized place on the internet for these kids to meet other kids from other schools. Some of them have become successful entrepreneurs already etc. I look at this place, the FLF @MJ DeMarco created and it's where lots of people get help! @Andy Black helped me with a new software that I am rolling out at my office - Basecamp, as the most recent example. There are too many to list. This is what gave me the idea for this charity, they need an online space that is exclusively for the kids that went though this program - to create a forum for them.

But I have no idea what it takes to create a forum. I assume it's a ton of work and I know MJ is here daily to ensure it functions as intended. I see lots of challenges.

This is why I am posting this and asking for your help with your thoughts and experiences. Here is what I think are "steps" or "challenges"

1. Choose a software to create your forum website. Where to even begin?
2. Organize your forum's structure. White boarding it might work.
3. Create user rules for your forum website.
4. Start conversations with interesting discussion topics.
5. Publish your forum on your website. Probably need a web designer engaged to do that?!
6. Moderate user participation and respond to inquiries. This may be the hardest part or maybe self-governing?

Any thoughts, ideas, help - all is welcome. Thanks in advance.

P.S. I will not be personally creating a forum, not enough knowledge or time. I'll want to hire someone to help me get it done. Might even have paid moderators etc.

P.P.S. @MJ DeMarco if it is inappropriate to ask on your forum how to create another forum, let me know and I'll delete this thread. I felt it wasn't a conflict because of the nature of 4th to 11th grade students being quite different from audience here and I'd want it locked only to those members, not open to the public.

 

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[Andy Black]

Hi FLF folks, need your help... especially @MJ DeMarco

I volunteered to help a local charity, likely will take a seat on their board. Excited is an understatement for how I feel about this one.

This charity has been around for over 20 years and supplies curriculum to schools that is 100% entrepreneurship based. Yes, it is recognized and is a plug in for our typical education here and applies to grades 4 to 11. Imagine that, kids playing entrepreneurs and actually making real money doing it, while earning a grade in school.

What I think is missing is a centralized place on the internet for these kids to meet other kids from other schools. Some of them have become successful entrepreneurs already etc. I look at this place, the FLF @MJ DeMarco created and it's where lots of people get help! @Andy Black helped me with a new software that I am rolling out at my office - Basecamp, as the most recent example. There are too many to list. This is what gave me the idea for this charity, they need an online space that is exclusively for the kids that went though this program - to create a forum for them.

But I have no idea what it takes to create a forum. I assume it's a ton of work and I know MJ is here daily to ensure it functions as intended. I see lots of challenges.

This is why I am posting this and asking for your help with your thoughts and experiences. Here is what I think are "steps" or "challenges"

1. Choose a software to create your forum website. Where to even begin?
2. Organize your forum's structure. White boarding it might work.
3. Create user rules for your forum website.
4. Start conversations with interesting discussion topics.
5. Publish your forum on your website. Probably need a web designer engaged to do that?!
6. Moderate user participation and respond to inquiries. This may be the hardest part or maybe self-governing?

Any thoughts, ideas, help - all is welcome. Thanks in advance.

P.S. I will not be personally creating a forum, not enough knowledge or time. I'll want to hire someone to help me get it done. Might even have paid moderators etc.

P.P.S. @MJ DeMarco if it is inappropriate to ask on your forum how to create another forum, let me know and I'll delete this thread. I felt it wasn't a conflict because of the nature of 4th to 11th grade students being quite different from audience here and I'd want it locked only to those members, not open to the public.

What ages are 4th to 11th grade?

Only this morning our 10 year old was asking about Discord. I think a lot of youngsters already know about Discord. I'm not saying to use it, just that kids may already be familiar with some platforms.

Are you trying to create a forum where kids can communicate with each other, or a lessons platform that allows kids to ask questions of the lessons?

 

[Antifragile]

What ages are 4th to 11th grade?

9-10 year olds and up to 16.

Only this morning our 10 year old was asking about Discord. I think a lot of youngsters already know about Discord. I'm not saying to use it, just that kids may already some platforms.

This is another excellent question ... does it have to be a forum or can it be something else entirely. Discord, Basecamp etc.? I don't know enough to know the answer.

Are you trying to create a forum where kids can communicate with each other, or a lessons platform that allows kids to ask questions of the lessons?

The curriculum is there, they have everything they need to launch their small business in school. I am trying to create a universal tie in for helping each other. One kid may ask their parents to help create something, another may ask a teacher, another will not ask anyone. What if they could log in to a place like a forum and ask, discuss, share...

Meaning, it is not a platform for curriculum learning, but a place like this FLF where you can talk about your own ideas, get feedback etc.

 

[Andy Black]

9-10 year olds and up to 16.



This is another excellent question ... does it have to be a forum or can it be something else entirely. Discord, Basecamp etc.? I don't know enough to know the answer.



The curriculum is there, they have everything they need to launch their small business in school. I am trying to create a universal tie in for helping each other. One kid may ask their parents to help create something, another may ask a teacher, another will not ask anyone. What if they could log in to a place like a forum and ask, discuss, share...

Meaning, it is not a platform for curriculum learning, but a place like this FLF where you can talk about your own ideas, get feedback etc.

Is there anything schools already commonly use?

 

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[Kak]

I am going to say, for something like this where their membership to a specific program gains them access to an internet community, discord sounds like the right call. It is essentially already done for you. No need to hire a developer. Just get the app, set up some categories, and give it to the charity to invite all the participants.

I have only observed it in passing, but it seemed like a pretty cool app pretty tailor made to this type of use.

 

[Antifragile]

Is there anything schools already commonly use?

Another great question. I don't yet know. But I'll ask kids and teachers when I visit. That may be key to acceptance too.

I am going to say, for something like this where their membership to a specific program gains them access to an internet community, discord sounds like the right call. It is essentially already done for you. No need to hire a developer. Just get the app, set up some categories, and give it to the charity to invite all the participants.

I have only observed it in passing, but it seemed like a pretty cool app pretty tailor made to this type of use.

I've used it a few times. Know so little about it... time to research and get a better understanding. Might be a quick and powerful solution here. Thanks.

 

[Andy Black]

Discord seems just the same as Slack to me, so if you've used Slack it will be very familiar.
Personally, I find them too "messagy", but that can be good for engagement and can create good community feels.

I think @Fox was using Circle.so for a bit before he moved back to Facebook groups.

 

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[msufan]

Listen, as a former elementary school teacher, this is something you have to be super careful about. There are laws protecting children's privacy online, there are bad apples who want to prey on kids, and there are kids who just do stupid things. So you have a MASSIVE liability on your hands here if you create this.

If you decide to go forward with this, Scratch (scratch.mit.edu) probably has the best example of what you want to create, except their focus is on coding instead of entrepreneurship. Heavily moderated, very active adult presence, ways to report issues and have them dealt with immediately, etc. Be careful with this idea!

 

[Andy Black]

Listen, as a former elementary school teacher, this is something you have to be super careful about. There are laws protecting children's privacy online, there are bad apples who want to prey on kids, and there are kids who just do stupid things. So you have a MASSIVE liability on your hands here if you create this.

If you decide to go forward with this, Scratch (scratch.mit.edu) probably has the best example of what you want to create, except their focus is on coding instead of entrepreneurship. Heavily moderated, very active adult presence, ways to report issues and have them dealt with immediately, etc. Be careful with this idea!

I'm wondering how much simpler it would be to only allow discussions (replies) to lessons (threads) created by teachers.

 

[MJ DeMarco]

1. Choose a software to create your forum website. Where to even begin?
2. Organize your forum's structure. White boarding it might work.
3. Create user rules for your forum website.
4. Start conversations with interesting discussion topics.
5. Publish your forum on your website. Probably need a web designer engaged to do that?!
6. Moderate user participation and respond to inquiries. This may be the hardest part or maybe self-governing?

1: Google forum software. Installing a forum is pretty easy these days. This forum is Xenforo, which sucks. I would avoid it, Discourse.org might be better since it is more mobile friendly which = kids.

2: Easy, structure it to your objective.

3: As @msufan you have to be vigilant here. As he said, there are laws in place when it comes to children, so even with a charity status, you might have many hurdles to hop here.

4: Oh boy, if I had a magic trick for this, I'd let you know. Starting a forum is hard as hell and it isn't something I'd recommend. In the begining, you need to create content all day, every day.

5: No, see #1.

6: Cart before the horse, worry about it when the need arises. Most forums, like blogs, are cemeteries. If you climb that hurdle, moderators probably need to be seriously vetted since you're dealing with children.

IMO, this is a classic example of wanting to be helpful in culture, but the system in place makes it difficult to do so. A classic case of the 1% of degenerates in the world ruin it for the 99%. This idea has good intentions, but legally it sounds like a mountain of problems.

 

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