Off or just off my rocker?

Some days I just feel a bit off. Kind of like I couldn’t talk my out of a paper bag. I often have so much to say that I can’t say anything at all. I wonder if my students often feel the same way. Much of the time they are a silent force and I wonder if anyone is out there. Hello? I hear no response... yet on occasion I may mention something random and they will speak out as if they had been positively bursting with ideas. So how can I get them to engage like this more often? With flexible delivery this becomes an even bigger challenge as the learning resources become more varied and students may be exploring their own individual paths through the material. I would like to be able to facilitate a link their pathways, like a spider web, connecting the learning resources into a learning community where they can interact. I can see where I could enjoy using Twitter in a live lecture but being a facilitator for a distance course means that I don't often have face-to-face leactures. Another problem that I can see is that too many options can be very confusing for students, I have seen that happen first hand. Students often struggle if there are too many options available in the initial stages of the course. I think they find security in knowing that they are current and caught up with the rest of the class. It is a fine line, providing structure and reassurance while encouraging self-exploration and divergence from the crowd. Of course a strongly structured course goes against the idea of self-paced learning however with flexible delivery it is important to also offer opportunities for self-customisation of the course material so that students can learn in a way that works for them. How do they know what will work for them? With regard to students discovering their learning style, how much of that process should course facilitators be responsible for?