A lot of the OP's comments about online education should be read critically by a lot of the teachers and professors out there who are currently experimenting wi

A lot of the OP's comments about online education should be read critically by a lot of the teachers and professors out there who are currently experimenting with a "flipped classroom". Short version: in a flipped classroom, you do the fixed content before the "lecture" period, and then during the "lecture" you do the "homework" in the prof's presence, with feedback, comments, and interaction. (There's a lot more to it; if you're curious, go look it up.) The problem as I see it is that a lot of the "flipped classroom" advocates see the ideal pre-class prep as just video-recorded lectures: do exactly what you used to do, except in front of a video camera. I think that the flipped classroom has a lot of merit and have incorporated some of its ideas in my own teaching, but I really feel like the people videotaping their lectures are really missing the point and need to read this blog post for some of the many reasons their approach is problematic.