The most obvious element lacking in a web class, especially with a large
enrollment, is the ease of communication between students and instructor.
A clear difference between the classes was that the majors felt that the web format was less effective. Ecology had a significant amount of quantitative work in it, although most was arithmetic. In spite of the examples of the quantitative techniques provided in the book, it soon became apparent that the students needed considerable support in the quantitative side of ecology. They were actually capable of doing the arithmetic, but many had trouble in working quantitative word problems.
The lack of quantitative reasoning skills in the sciences is a serious deficiency. Additional assignments that will "ease" the students into reasoning quantitatively will be added to the course.