The Disembodied Classroom: Adapting a Multimodal Business Communication Course for Distance Education

Abstract

Dan‖ is 55, a former sole-proprietor of a computer hardware business that didn't survive the dot-com bubble. He's now finishing the college degree he set aside in the 70s, and hopes to start a new career in supply-chain management. In the meantime, he works as a long-haul trucker, and he usually participates in my class' online discussion sessions by pulling into rest stops with free Wi-Fi internet access. Tonight, however, a traffic jam outside of Denver has left him behind schedule and miles away from the next rest stop. He phones into class.Our first exercise is based on a file I emailed to the session participants a week before. After asking the other students to open the file on their computers, I tell Dan that he can sit out this part of the session: he can jump in if he has something to add, but I understand that his circumstances… He interrupts. -Oh, no. It's Ok. I printed it out over the weekend. Just gimme a minute to tack it up on my visor.‖ He explains that he's put clips on his sun visor, and that he's going to hang the pages of the exercise there so he can read them while he drives.