Course to discourse?

I've begun my year with my traditional online forum discussion using the forum tool embedded in our Intranet software package Moodle. The course I teach is NCEA Level 2 Economics, a course that requires deep thinking, and a lot of analytical writing. The literacy expectations of the course are well expressed by the fact that the three external standards all provide UE literacy (Writing) credits, while the internal standard we offer provides UE  literacy (Reading) credits.

The topic I choose is a discussion of the issue of the free market. It almost invariable ends up as a discussion of the libertarian paradox as we embrace issues such as power imbalances and inequality associated with markets.

My approach is always the same, The boys post in response to my fundamental question about the benefits or otherwise of the free market. As they post, I respond individually to every post written by every boy. However my response is NEVER to give answers, ALWAYS to pose further questions. My response to every boy is unique, asking questions that are specific to that boy's post, steering and guiding in a way appropriate to that boy's current knowledge (as revealed by his post) and the specific angle that the boy appears to be taking in the discussion. I think that this is a fantastic way to differentiate learning.

This year's result is strikingly more sophisticated than in previous years. I have been more careful about my responses, trying to make sure that I even more appropriately tailor each response to each boy. Regardless of the medium (online, on paper, face to face) this has always been true.

The result has been a significant amount of learning, created by constant (socratic?) questioning. At no stage have I given any of the bis specific knowledge/content, yet the learning has been apparent and significant. I asked the boys if they had learned much, and they universally agreed that they had.

Course to discourse? I'm not sure that I necessarily understand what that means, but I hope so.