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So if you had to give up your lectures, what and how did you teach? Discussion-based learning works well, but I don't see how you could rely on that alone for an entire semester. I work from a highly structured syllabus so that I and all my students know exactly what we'll be covering on a specific day. And given the amount of material I need to cover, there's not much leeway for side issues.
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That is a tough issue. One of the first things I did when I realized my lectures weren't going to work so well on the MOO was to email a copy of them to all my students. In fact, I'm adopting this technique in all my classes now. There's no reason for me to hoard those lectures and read them to students. It saves a good deal of class time if they can read them just as they read the book. Actually, I think it works better if they have my lecture material while they read the book. Then class time can be devoted entirely to questions and answers or group discussions.
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It strikes me, though, that class preparation can become a real problem in this environment. For example, what happens if students bring up issues that more properly belong later in the semester? I've spent a long time developing a sequence-based approach in my classes. MOOs seem to disrupt that kind of structure.
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Teaching in a MOO needn't make any difference in that regard. When a student brings up an issue like that, you could respond by saying that the issue will be covered later in the semester. But the beauty of the MOO is that it allows for a more free-wheeling, back-and-forth coverage of the material. It really is challenging and fun. MOOs challenge you to find and create a structure out of an actual experience--the class interaction. But I guess you do spend a lot of time on class preparation.
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More dialogue
Commentary on preparation
Conclusion
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