Virtual Classroom Management and Communicative Writing Pedagogy

Writing, essentially a social act, is concerned with cognition and is alliedto context. Most writing takes the form of dialogue and it is out of dialogic processes that language acquisition takes place. Writers andreaders convene in the cognitive and social space that is at the heart of adiscourse community. The social aspects of writing are diminished whenthere is a restriction on the social space where readers and writers cometogether. This is exemplified by the state of affairs in certain classroomswhere writing, reading and responding are undertaken in a solitarymanner. The use of computers to teach writing can enliven socialexchange by engendering new social structures. In particular,collaboration between writers is prompted by the use of word processors.When the teaching of writing takes place in a computer lab, teachers oftenstructure activities in a qualitatively different manner. In turn this has aninfluence on student writing. This paper reports on our experience of teaching an in-sessional course in Academic Writing to L2 students at theUniversity of Luton.