<p>I am just starting to play with Django/Python and am trying to shift into the MTV mode of programming that Django asks for (insists on).  Deciding on what functions should be methods of a model vs simple being a function in a view has so far been confusing.  Does anyone know of a book, website, blog, slideshow, whatever that discusses Web Framework programming in more general, abstract terms?  I imagine just a book on object oriented programming would do it, but I feel like that would be overkill - I was looking for something web framework specific.</p>

If you aren't absolutely set on diving into Django and don't mind trying something else as a start, you might want to give
WSGI
a shot, which allows you to template your application your own way using a
third party engine
, rather than having to go exactly by Django's rules.  This also allows you to peek at a lower level of handling requests, so you get a bit better understanding of what Django is doing under the hood.