Distance learning can provide greater access to educational opportunities. However, the quality of teaching and learning in distance learning continues as a challenge due, at least in part, to the demands for more substantive and systemic instructional design to account for the limits imposed by human distance. Interaction has been identified empirically as increasing learner motivation, satisfaction, participation, communication, and achievement. However, the lack of rigorous and usable instructional design guidelines hinders the realization of interaction's benefits for distance learning. This study investigated how interaction supports learning in order to develop an interaction design framework that any educator can use to improve learning at a distance. This study employed a newer methodology, Design and Development Research, to create a literature-based, expert-validated three-phase framework for use by educators to identify instructional design choices that are grounded in learning interaction theory and research.