Key ideas

The idea that there are conventional criteria for a “distance education” course which can all be transgressed, see illustration at the bottom.

Could also be pedagogical aspect of teacher-learner transaction.

No discussion of other students, I guess students didn't interact so much with each other back then?

Moore and Kearsley (1996): increasing communication gap between teacher and learner, presence or absence of dialogue, extent to which predetermined structure is built into learning activity.

High structure + low dialogue = high transactional distance

Low transactional distance = continuous dialogue with instructor

Is this similar to my idea of "granularity of collaboration? Not sure how this applies to self-learning / peer collaboration contexts. Similar to dialogue/monologue?

Does the learner need more independence to deal with a high level of structure, or the opposite, an absence of structure?

Meaning is, in its origins, a physical activity (grasping, seeing), a social activity (it requires another), a survival activity (in doing it, we live). Meaning, understood in this way, is the primary human motion, irreducible.

Act of learning = (the) fundamental psychological impulse

Reed (1997): receptor vs perceiver (perceiving is active)