Making judgement calls as part of effective online facilitation

A fascinating issue has been raised in a short online course that I am currently facilitating. The course is to do with the effective facilitation of online discussions. The issue concerns how should facilitators respond when participants in an online course interpret a learning activity in a different way from what was originally intended? My response would be that it partly depends on the stakes involved. If it is a "high stakes" assessment-related activity, then I would agree that there is a reason for steering participants back to the expected track; particularly if the track they are heading down will impact negatively on their marks. However, if it is a low stakes activity, then I think there is scope for facilitators to exercise some flexibility and judgement, particularly if the discussion activity that is happening is consistent with the intended learning outcomes. A further issue is if students are interpreting the activity differently from the instructions, then perhaps this indicates the need for a possible redesign of the activity or the instructions given to students for future offerings. No simple answers here, but certainly these are issues worth pondering if course designers and facilitators want to avoid being Lost in translation (see previous posting).