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General Information

Select a feature to learn more about it.

Overview of the Yellowdig Interface

This section will give information on the main Yellowdig interface. It is important to become familiar with these tools, as they will help you better communicate and engage with your classmates through the platform.

The Yellowdig interface includes the: Main Navigation Panel, Community Menu, Profile Panel, Main Content, and Utility Panel. Read more about each section below.

Main Navigation Panel

The main navigation panel controls which section of your Yellowdig you are viewing. This menu has four tabs:

  • Home: In the home tab, you can see all of your unviewed posts, view the list of your communities, and find public communities to join.
  • Communities: The communities tab allows you to select, view, and engage with the communities you have joined. This is the place you will spend most of your time on Yellowdig, and its contents are detailed further below.
  • Messages: The messages tab is where you can interact with individuals or groups of people outside of a community.
  • Bookmarks: This bookmarks tab is where you can view and filter posts or comments you have bookmarked from multiple communities.
  • Notifications: The Notifications button shows where other community members have engaged with your posts. You can change your notifications options in the Community Settings tab.
Yellowdig main navigation panel top left in community outlined and arrowed to

Community Menu

The community menu contains all information relating to the currently selected community.

  • Community: The community tab contains the main feed for the currently selected community. This is where you can earn points and engage with your classmates through making, replying to, and reacting to posts.
  • Drafts: The drafts tab shows all of your non-posted drafts for the current selected community. Yellowdig automatically saves posts as a draft as you write them, so if you need to recover a post you were writing or simply come back to it later, you can find it in the drafts tab.
  • Bookmarks: This bookmarks tab is where you can view and filter posts or comments you have bookmarked for this specific community.
  • My Participation: The participation tab gives a complete breakdown of the points you have earned in the selected community. You can view points by period and overall, as well as view your current grade.
  • Activity: The activity dropdown has two sub-sections:
    • Activity Feed: The activity feed shows recent activity in the currently selected community via a timeline, with the most recent engagement at the top.
    • Posted Files: This section gives a list of all documents posted to the community, allowing you to easily find and download important documents.
  • Members: The member list gives an engagement leaderboard, showing who in the community is most active. It also displays a list of community facilitators, and all community members.
  • Settings: The community settings dropdown has only one component:
    • Notifications: Community notifications settings allows you to change all options relating to engagement notifications in the currently selected community. Here you can toggle email and in-app notifications for each different type of engagement.
Yellowdig community menu panel in community outlined and arrowed to

Profile Panel

The Profile Menu contains settings and information that applies to your entire account, rather than to specific communities:

  • Help: The Help section contains valuable information about all aspects of Yellowdig. You can also use the built-in search function of Help to find specific information.
  • Announcements: The Announcements section contains updates and changes for Yellowdig. Any time a new feature is added or an existing feature is improved, you can find information about it in Announcements.
  • Organization Options: Organization options allows you to switch between different organizations. This button is unnecessary to use if you only use Yellowdig through Embry-Riddle.
  • User Options: User options allows you to view and edit your public profile, as well as edit your Yellowdig account settings.
Yellowdig profile panel, bottom left, in community outlined and arrowed to

Main Content

This is where the main content of the currently selected page is displayed. Most often, this area will be populated by the community feed.

Main content area outlined and arrowed to

Utility Panel

The Utility panel only exists in certain pages of Yellowdig. Most often, you will see it while viewing a community. In this case, you may use it to post, filter and sort posts, and view your points overview.

Utility side panel only available on certain yellowdig pages, outlined and arrowed to.

How to Create a Post in Yellowdig

One of the most important features of Yellowdig is posting. Posting is the best way for students to earn points in Yellowdig and is critical to driving discussion in the platform. Because of Yellowdig's intuitive, social media-like design, you'll likely find it quick and easy to post in Yellowdig!

Step 1

Create New Post

In your Yellowdig community select the create button outlined and arrowed to

While inside a community, select Create from the utility panel.

Step 2

Title Your Post

Add Title of post in field labeled Title outlined and arrowed to

Titling posts is required in Yellowdig. To title a post, select the Title text box and enter the desired title.

Step 3

Add Topic(s)

Add Topic button outlined on top of your new post with arrow to list of topics

Yellowdig posts must also belong to at least one topic. Topics are valuable because they can be used later to sort and filter community posts. There are several topics available for you to choose from; available topics vary by course.

To add a topic to a post, select the Add Topic button

Step 4

Add Content

Post main content outlined with content text length goal outlined and arrowed to

The most important step to posting in Yellowdig is adding content! You have the potential to earn a great deal of points when posting content that is insightful, thorough, and engaging.

While creating the post content, students will see how many points the post will earn.

Note: Your instructor will be monitoring the community feed and can adjust the number of points you're awarded for a post at any time. This gives you the incentive to make sure what you're posting is meaningful and related to course content.

Step 5

Add Features

Add Features available for Post labeled A-I

There are many features you can add to a post. These features are a great way for students to improve the quality of their posts and make them more engaging to their peers.

Read more about each feature below:

  1. Topics: Add topics that relate to your post using the Topics feature. Adding topics helps your community members filter and sort posts. For more information visit Yellowdig Support Article: Add Topic(s)
  2. Make Anonymous: You can make your post anonymous to other community members by selecting this feature if it is enabled in your community. The instructor can always see the author of a post.
  3. Attach: From this option, you will be able to attach a general File, Video file, Image file, or Audio file.
  4. Record: Allows you to record video or audio to add to your post. For more information visit Yellowdig Support Article: Record Video or Audio Snippet
  5. Emoji: When you select an Emoji, it will appear at your cursor position in the content section of the post. For more information visit Yellowdig Support Article: Add Emoji(s)
  6. Draw: Adding drawings to your post can help your community members visualize your point(s). This feature lets you draw using your mouse (or finger on touch screens) with different size and color brushes. You can also upload a background image and describe your drawing. For more information visit Yellowdig Support Article: Add a Drawing
  7. Poll: Polls are an effective way to gain input from the entire community in Yellowdig. For more information visit Yellowdig Support Article: Create a Poll
  8. Formula: Adding mathematical formulas to your Yellowdig post can be easily accomplished using the Formula feature. This feature uses LaTeX code to generate mathematical formulas. The editor can be used with the built in virtual keyboard or hard coded in the basic editor with LaTeX code. For more information visit Yellowdig Support Article: Inserting Formulas & Code Snippets
  9. Submit: Submits your post with the selected topic, content, files, etc.

Step 6

Example Post

Example post outlined and arrowed to

After you have finished adding the content of your post, select Submit to post it to the community feed. Once it has been posted, your community members will be able to reply and react to it. Your points earned will also automatically be updated.

As more community members post, your post will move positions on the community feed because the most recent posts will always go to the top of the feed, below any posts your instructor has pinned.

How to Engage with Posts in Yellowdig

Engaging with posts from other users is an essential feature of Yellowdig. Engaging with posts from community members is a great way to offer feedback for their ideas, as well as earn points.

There are a few ways to engage with a post: Adding a Reaction or Adding a Comment. You are also encouraged to Flag/Report a Post that may have inappropriate, off-topic, plagiarized, or otherwise worrisome content. Doing so will alert your instructor to review the flagged post or comment.

Adding a Reaction

Adding an emoji reaction to a post offers your community members quick insight on their ideas. To react to any content in Yellowdig, follow these steps:

Step 1

Add Reaction

Select the add reaction icon outlined and arrowed to, to add a reaction

On the post you would like to react to, select the Add Reaction icon.

Step 2

Choose Reaction

List of all reactions in Yellowdig

Select whichever emoji you'd like to use for your interaction. You may scroll through the emojis or use the search bar, but the most commonly used reactions are located at the top.

Removing a Reaction

Select the reaction icon you would like to remove, and it will be removed from the post. If other community members have added the same reaction, Yellowdig will only remove your reaction from the overall count.

Adding a Comment

Commenting is the most informative way to engage with your community members' posts. This allows you to give in-depth feedback on your community members' ideas, while earning points for you and the author of the original post.

Step 1

Add Comment

Post in Yellowdig Select the reaction button outlined and arrowed to

On the post you would like to engage with, select Comment.

Step 2

Add Content

Comment main content outlined and arrowed to

Add the content of your comment to the text area. For information on how to use the Yellowdig post features, review the Creating a Post tab.

Step 3

Post Comment

To Post a comment, after all content is in the text area, select post comment outlined and arrowed to

To add your comment, select Submit.

Adding a comment is an activity that boosts a post to the top of the Yellowdig feed, regardless of the original post date.

Flag/Report a Post

If you find any content in your community to be inappropriate, off-topic, plagiarised, or otherwise worrisome, you should report it. To report a post or comment, follow these steps:

Step 1

Flag Post

On an Inappropriate post, select the Flag icon outlined and arrowed to

On the inappropriate post, select Flag Post.

Step 2

Flag Form

Example reason for flagging outlined and arrowed to

Give a brief explanation why the post does not belong in the community, and select the report reason that best matches the post.

Step 3

Submit Flag

After explaining why the post was flagged, select submit outlined

After filling out the report form, select Submit to send the report to your instructor for review.

Earning Extra Points

In addition to earning points by posts/comments, you can earn additional points if:

  • Your instructor manually awards additional points to your post or comment. Your instructor may do this if they determine that your post should earn more (or less!) points than awarded by the Yellowdig platform.
  • Your instructor gives you one or more Accolades for your post or comment. You're more likely to earn an Accolade from your instructor if your post is insightful, exemplary, generates conversation, provides value to the community, drives engagement, etc.

Note: Your course instructor is the first point of contact if you have any questions, comments, or concerns about extra points you were awarded (or points you lost).

A list of example accolades in Yellowdig

Example of a Post with Accolades Awarded

Example post with awarded accolades outlined and arrowed to

Understanding How Scoring Works in Yellowdig

Because Yellowdig is a unique way to approach asynchronous discussions, it is important that you understand how you are graded in Yellowdig. This section reviews how you earn points and how you can keep track of your grade. Your Canvas course may have specific directions regarding required or potential content for your Yellowdig work.

Read the following information to ensure you understand how scoring in Yellowdig works:

  • How do students earn points in Yellowdig?
  • How do students keep track of their Yellowdig progress?
  • How does Yellowdig appear in the Canvas gradebook?

How do students earn points in Yellowdig?

Students can earn points based on the actions and responses they make within the community in a few ways:

  • Creating a post
  • Engaging with oosts
  • Earning extra points (awarded by instructor)

The number of points awarded for any activity is dependent on the course settings. If the Canvas course doesn't describe the community's point system, students and faculty can also view the distribution of points in the How to earn points link in the Yellowdig utility panel.

Student points overview with points earned outlined and show details outlined and arrowed to

How do students keep track of their Yellowdig progress?

To help make sure students are on track throughout the term, Yellowdig identifies each week of the term as a period. Each period has a max number of points a student can earn.

A new period begins each module, but the community content in that period is not limited to a single module. In addition to any specific directions in the Canvas course, students can post/comment on topics from other modules during any period.

A student's Yellowdig grade will display in Canvas throughout the term; it is recalculated at the start of every period (module week) and it can go up or down depending on your activity. Read more about the Yellowdig Weekly Point System.

To make sure they are going to meet the Total Point Goal for your Community by the end of the term, students should try to make the Points Earned equal the My Period Max value each period. If a student always earns the maximum number of points available each period, they will never have to worry about how many points are needed to get a good grade in Yellowdig!

Students may review their recent activity by selecting My participation.

Student points overview

How does Yellowdig appear in the Canvas gradebook?

Because a student's Yellowdig grade accumulates across the entire term, they will only have 1 assignment in the Canvas gradebook. This assignment will update approximately once an hour with their most recent Yellowdig score.

You will notice that the due date for this assignment is the end of the course; this is because students are allowed to work in the community for the entire term and their grade is only finalized at the end of the term.

How to Filter & Sort Posts in Yellowdig

Filtering and Sorting posts allows you to quickly and easily locate specific posts in the community.

How to Filter Posts

Step 1

Select Filter

In your community, select Filter outlined and arrowed to

While inside your community, select Filter from the utility panel.

Step 2

Filter Options

From the list of filters that appears, select the filters that best suit your needs. You can have several filters active at the same time.

  • By Topic
  • By Member
  • By Date
  • By Accolade
  • By Hashtag
  • My Content
  • Community Owner (instructor)
  • By Read Status
Filter option menu

Sorting Posts

Step 1

Select Sort

In your community, select Sort outlined

While inside your community, select Sort from the utility panel.

Step 2

Sort Options

Sort option menu

From the list of sorting options, select the option that best fits your needs.

  • By Recent Posts or Comments: Allows you to view the posts in order of most recent engagement. If a post is older, but has received a comment more recently, it will appear above newer posts with older comments. This is the default sorting option for Yellowdig.
  • By Recent Posts Allows you to arrange the feed in order of most recent posts. This sort will ignore comments on posts, and use exclusively the post date.
  • By Active Posts: Enables you to arrange the feed in order of level of engagement on posts. This does not take into account when the post was created or when comments were made, it is entirely based on how many comments and reactions a post has received.

Note: No matter which sort is applied, instructor pinned posts will always appear at the top of the feed.

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This page was last updated May 12, 2025