Students who are angry or preoccupied are not open to new learning, especially passive learning. To make lectures work, some means must be available to check the accuracy of students' understanding of the material . Students must believe that others care about them as individuals, and in the quality of their learning. Finally, lectures must be entertaining in order to capture students' attention. In distance education classes, for lecturing to be successful, students must become active cognitively.
Distance education succeed if it offers only a passive learning environment for students.
Instructors must activate the learning through cooperative interaction with peers, at the on-campus site as well as the distant sites. I use informal cooperative learning groups, which are temporary, ad hoc groups designed to last for only one discussion or class meeting. The purposes are to focus students' attention on the material to be learned, to set a mood conducive to learning, to help organize in advance the material to be covered in class, to ensure that students cognitively process the material being taught, and to provide closure to an instructional setting. The distance of distance education lends itself to gaps in communication and understanding. Informal cooperative learning groups help ensure that misconceptions, incorrect understanding, and gaps in understanding are identified and corrected, and that learning experiences are personalized.