The work of designing, delivering, and teaching a distance learning course is best divided among several specialists. The course is then the product of a course team.

At a minimum, a course team consists of a content specialist supported by atechnology specialist, as when a teacher designs a study g uide with the help of an editor, or a video conference course with the help of a producer.

Because it is usually best to use several technologies in a distance learning course, course teams, particularly those in single-mode institutions, generally consist of a dozen or more members. These members might include:

• One or more content specialists
• One or more instructional designers
• A video producer (and perhaps script writers)
• An audio producer (and perhaps script writers)
• A text editor
• A computer software and Internet specialist
• A photographer, a graphic designer, or an artist
• One or more administrators.

In a consortium or an electronic virtual organization the team members could bein many different locations or institutions.

More on course teams

• M. Kelly, Course Creation Issues in Distance Education

• Chaiyong Brahmawong, Course Development Technique: A Course Developer's Experience at Sukhothai Thammathirat University

• The Open University of Hong Kong course team information

• Indira Gandhi National Open University course development information