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THINGS YOU SHOULD KNOW ABOUT CHAT ROOMS
Chat rooms are typically used in one of two capacities. (1) General Open Chats: chat rooms are provided to students for general discussion and project work with classmates. In this case, students decide when to chat online, and the chat software remains open and available at all times. (2) Hosted, Moderated Chats: specific chat activities are planned by the instructor who establishes a plan and a time for chatting in advance and informs his or her audience of the chat plan and schedule. A hosted chat will typically require a moderator who may guide a discussion or talk about a paper or project. More advanced chat rooms might allow the moderator to show and mark-up an image or demonstrate a software application. In some cases, students may be the hosts or moderators, as described in the sample activities later.

Hosted chat activities are somewhat time-zone dependent. For instance, it will be challenging to schedule a hosted, live chat with a classroom in Australia due to the time differences (9am in Blacksburg today equates to 1am in Sydney, Australia tomorrow; but 4pm in Blacksburg today would allow for live chatting with Sydney, Australia at 8am tomorrow).
Chat screens are frequently cluttered by 5, 10, 15, or more individuals attempting to communicate at one time. Too many posts at once can be confusing. Click to enlarge the sample image at right to view a sample chat screen. As individuals post to this chat screen, their comments appear at the bottom of the screen, with prior comments scrolling upward.