on 10/28/06 5:50 AM, Cormac Lawler at cormaggio(a)gmail.com wrote: <major snip> Question: what privileges/authority are to be conferred on people labelled as teachers? And in what context? Another question: is it practical to push the collaborative model (everyone is equal, no one has status) into online learning? Especially when you're using coded routines to deliver the learning materials? Don't know. I can foresee advantages in freezing course content from editing once it's put into delivery in an online learning context, while leaving the same course still available for edits by everyone not taking the course. One course, seen differently depending on how you log on. Someone who logs into a particular online course could be (possibly should be) seen by the system as either a course facilitator (instructor, teaching assistant, etc.) or as a student, present to participate, not to re-wire the course. There are advantages in having a label which designates status on particular pages (or areas) of the system. John could be seen by the system as a registered student in High Energy Physics, but a course organizer in the Poetry of John Donne. And having no particular status in all other areas. Just exactly what teacher and student would mean in practical terms may well be different in each area. Different needs, all that stuff. I suspect this is the direction in which the system may evolve. Morley Chalmers -- Do not worry if you have built your castles in the air. They are where they should be. Now put the foundations under them. -- Henry David Thoreau