While a great deal of attention is currently paid to putting individual courses or entire degree programs online, less attention is paid to what makes these courses effective. Online courses are successful and effective once instructors analyze learning communities in a traditional classroom and transfer the knowledge successfully to the online learning environment. Some of the effective learning community strategies for online courses are communication tools to actively engage students. Once students are engaged in the online course, they begin building learning communities that aid in the successful completion of online courses. Online instructors need to be focused on the collaboration and communication tools for implementing learning communities in their courses. Topics covered in this paper include the needs of students in a traditional classroom, the role of observed interaction, challenges posed when creating online learning communities, difficulties faced by students and the skills necessary to survive in an online course, and difficulties faced by instructors in an online class. Guidelines for creating online learning communities are offered, including: (1) communicate frequently with the class; (2) create a space for non-classroom related interaction; and (3) understand the limitations and strengths of the technology being used. (Contains 19 references.) (Author/MES)