Teacher has special burden for communication at all levels

Since transactions depend on communication, the different characteristics of current electronic communication modes need to be managed and focused for the various purposes of teaching. E-mail and Web pages might be said to be "cool" media, since they are always there in the background to foster transaction when the student wants it to happen. On the other hand, real-time conferencing is a "hot" medium, that absorbs attention and focuses thinking NOW, while others are doing it and while ideas, questions, problems, and emotions are being created, communicated, and used. BOTH of these modes are necessary to education, and in many ways the computer-based class is like the ideal of the traditional university course. The "cooler" input and guidance dimensions of textbook and lecture are balanced by the "hotter" transactional aspects of discussion, debate, and response, both written and oral.

Teachers, then, must be exceptionally careful to express meanings clearly, both in communications to the class as a whole, and in exchanges with individual students, especially in responses to writings. And teachers must at the same time maintain an even emotional keel to avoid unintentional offense or confusion.