Studying L2 writers’ digital writing: An argument for post-critical methods

Because the fields of digital writing and second language (L2) writing both have rich methodological traditions, researchers designing a study that examines issues at the intersection of these two fields have multiple methodological traditions to draw upon. Recognizing the choices that researchers face, we advocate adopting post-critical methodologies, as articulated by Patricia Sullivan and James E. Porter for these digital/L2 inquiries. A post-critical approach, we believe, enhances these studies by emphasizing their interdisciplinary and ideological nature. After defining what a post-critical methodology entails, we connect it to recent research trends in digital writing, L2 writing, and L2 studies. To help future researchers design digital/L2 writing studies, we explain the implications of these approaches.     

Computer-based reading and writing across the curriculum: Two case studies of L2 writers

Since the early 1980s, second language (L2) writing specialists have been examining possible roles for computers in L2 writing instruction. How, and to what extent, L2 students use computer for academic literacy purposes beyond the writing classroom, that is, across the curriculum, has not received much attention. Because a common goal of L2 college level writing courses is to prepare students to write in these other domains, an awareness of computer-based literacy activities in non-L2 writing courses is essential to the cause of helping L2 writing instructors connect what students learn in their courses to how they write (and read) in other courses. This paper describes research aimed at contributing to such awareness: a qualitative study of the computer-based reading and writing activity of two undergraduate English as a Second Language (ESL) students beyond ESL writing courses.     

The effects of participation,performance, and interest in a game‐based writing environment

We have observed that many computer‐supported writing environments based on pedagogical strategies have only been designed to incorporate the cognitive aspects, but motivational aspects should also be included. Hence, we theorize that integrating game‐based learning into the writing environment may be a practical approach that can facilitate student participation, not only helping students learn how to write, but also sustaining their willingness to write. In this study, we investigate the effects of the game‐based writing environment on improving students' participation, performance, and interest in writing. An experiment was conducted to compare the effectiveness of 2 approaches to writing in language arts at an elementary school. Two hundred forty‐five third grade students participated in the experiment over a period of 1 year. One hundred thirty‐nine students were assigned to an experimental group and learned with a game‐based writing environment, and 106 students were in the contrast group and learned with an online writing environment. The empirical results show that the game‐based writing environment can effectively promote students' writing participation, writing performance, interest in writing, as well as their perceptions of the use of educational self‐management games. Some implications of the experimental results are also discussed.     

Management-aided software engineering

Two veteran software managers examine some of today's management best practices for signs of what might become generally accepted practice in the near future. They present these practices from a small sample of healthy organizations. In addition, they envision how software management might mature over the next few decades to produce a new generation of best practices     

面向高校师生的应用文CAW系统研究

面向高等院校师生开发了一套应用文计算机辅助写作(CAW,Computer-AidedWriting)系统。该系统对高校师生常用的各种典型应用文从文体和用户的角度给出了两种分类,制作了写作模板,并提供了例文。该系统的写作模板可定制、例文库内容可添加,具有较强的行业针对性和较好的可扩展性。经网上问卷调查和测试结果表明,该系统有助于高校师生提高写作效率。     

Automated computer-based feedback in expressive writing

Previous studies indicate that changing pronoun use can moderate the health benefits of expressive writing. Participants who change their pronoun use from essay to essay benefit more from the exercise. The current experiment attempted to improve the expressive writing paradigm by altering subjects’ focus (specifically self- and other-related focus) through text-based instructions. The automated language-based system was simple to implement, and it successfully changed participants’ pronoun use, but the intervention had no mood-related or subjective benefits. While the automated intervention system has promise in guiding people’s natural writing, future research must address the broader question of the inherent links between language use and substantive psychological change.     

Where is computing headed?

Technological change is putting entire industries on the betting line. For computer technologists, these shifts can mean opportunity or disappointment as one technology is replaced by another. Therefore, it is important that we consider economic and technical forces when we plan for the future. By studying predictable technology and asking “what if” questions where developments are less certain, we can envision the state of computing in another 10 years     

DIMENSIONS OF CHANGE DURING DEVELOPMENT FROM A PREINDUSTRIAL TO A MODERN SOCIETY

Less developed areas of the world, such as former socialist countries of Central and Eastern Europe, need to catch-up with the more advanced countries, such as the West. It mighl be helpful to understand more holistically what has been going on in the development of the more advanced ones from their stage of a preindustrial society to a modern one. This is an attempt to compile changing stages in terms of a set of different dimensions in order to help envision the current actual situation of the latecomers and their potential future. It is supposed to provoke rather than prescribe.     

书面汉语分词连写的合理性与紧迫性及其实现

本文结合信息处理技术的发展,指出在书面语中采用分词连写的合理性和紧迫性,提出应将这一思想纳入相应的中文信息处理标准中,并在一些未来的信息平台(如eBook、WWW)上加以体现。同时对分词连写在具体实施时所面临的如何适应人们长期以来形成的读写习惯问题,给出了一个可行的解决办法。     

Reviewing Practices in Collaborative Writing

This paper presents an interview study in which 11 academics as interviewees participated for the purpose of revealing common collaborative writing practices, with particular focus on reviewing documents. First, we present the findings obtained concerning the issues of co-operating strategies underlying the reviewing process, how people revise their documents and comment on them, what they use the previous revision history for, and to what extent current technology is used in the reviewing process. Second, we also discuss aspects of the design of collaborative writing tools.     

Determining effective distance learning designs through usability testing

To add to the developing understanding of Web-based writing instruction, we conducted usability testing to assess the design of our online first-year composition courses at a large community college in the Southwest. Beyond the course-specific results, this study offers two primary contributions. First, it offers a model for conducting usability testing of Web-based writing classes to diagnose potential design problems in a course. This includes providing an indication of what kinds of results and data teachers should expect to gather, how to interpret that data, where to go for assistance, whom to involve in the testing process, and what to do with the results. Second, this study provides an initial understanding of guidelines for course design using Web-based technologies. These guidelines were developed by examining writing classes in the study and then comparing the results with already established principles of design from usability engineering.     

Flash存储管理的研究与设计

针对目前存储管理对大容量NAND Flash考虑的不足,在对大容量NAND Flash物理特性深入研究的基础上,实现了连续写与非连续写技术,提高了存储管理的效率.首先研究并实现了特有的状态信息描述方法,完全符合大容量MLC类型NAND Flash的物理特性,研究并实现了区域映射技术,适用于任何容量的闪存,并实现了连续写与非连续写技术,提高了写大文件的效率.实验结果表明,该方法在文件传输方面最大限度地挖掘了MLC类型NAND Flash的性能.     

Toward a Complexity of Online Learning: Learners in Online First-Year Writing

In response to the growing presence of online first-year writing courses, this paper describes a case study of two online first-year writing courses and addresses the questions: What do students in an online first-year writing course perceive as good study habits, and what helps them succeed? Data includes surveys, online discussions, course management statistics, and selected interviews. The study is supported by social cognitive theory described by psychologist Albert Bandura; this methodology allows for examination of internal, external, and behavioral characteristics of participating students. Results of the study indicate that students who rated themselves as making good use of study time also succeeded in the course. Insights from students include information about study activities, management of study time, access to technology, and attitudes about online courses. A surprising result of the study was that students did not consider communication with peers as a productive study activity, despite a deliberate attempt by instructors to build peer interaction into the course. Yet students also reported high levels of engagement and positive attitudes about online learning. The social cognitive lens provides helpful insights about these complex findings by examining the external, internal, and behavioral aspects of online first-year writing students in this study.     

The impact of e-feedback on the revisions of L2 writers in an academic writing course

This study explored the relationship between electronic feedback (e-feedback) and its impact on second-language (L2) writers’ revisions specifically focusing on how L2 students responded to their peers and what kinds of revisions they made as a result of the feedback they received. The 20 L2 writers wrote, responded, and revised on a database-driven web site specifically designed for writing and responding. Other forms of feedback they received included oral feedback from friends and peers and from face-to-face meetings with university writing center tutors. Results suggest students preferred oral feedback. However, e-feedback had a greater impact on revision than oral feedback, implying that e-feedback might be more useful. Additionally, e-feedback helped L2 writers focus on larger writing blocks. Thus, L2 writers may use e-feedback to create macro revisions. This exploratory study highlights a new form of revising and responding and offers insights into joining oral response to online collaboration.     

Non-existence of systematic education on computerized writing in Japanese schools

In Japanese schools, from elementary to college levels, digital technologies are not widely used for writing education. It sounds paradoxical that computer use in writing education is not flourishing in a country where ordinary people, especially the youth, actively use the Internet and cellular phones to exchange written (or typed) messages, where schools are well-equipped with computer technologies, and where the government shows guidelines and rationales for using information and communication technologies in teaching and learning at schools. This article analyzes the background behind this paradoxical situation. After analyzing how much research on and the practice of digital writing education has been made in the country, this paper discusses the nature of writing education and digital discourse in the Japanese culture and its possible relations to the lack of computerized writing education in Japanese schools.     

Task factor usability ratings for different age groups writing Chinese

This study evaluated how different task factors affect performance and user subjective preferences for three different age groups of Chinese subjects (6–11, 20–23, 65–70 years) when hand writing Chinese characters. The subjects copied Chinese character sentences with different settings for the task factors of writing plane angle (horizontal 0°, slanted 15°), writing direction (horizontal, vertical), and line spacing (5 mm, 7 mm and no lines). Writing speed was measured and subjective preferences (effectiveness and satisfaction) were assessed for each of the task factor settings. The result showed that there was a conflict between writing speed and personal preference for the line spacing factor; 5 mm line spacing increased writing speed but it was the least preferred. It was also found that: vertical and horizontal writing directions and a slanted work surface suited school-aged children; a horizontal work surface and horizontal writing direction suited university students; and a horizontal writing direction with either a horizontal or slanted work surface suited the older adults.     

Empirical Study on Collaborative Writing: What Do Co-authors Do, Use, and Like?

How do people work when they are collaborating to write a document? What kind of tools do they use and, in particular, do they resort to groupware for this task? Forty-one people filled out a questionnaire placed on the World Wide Web. In spite of the existence of specialized collaborative writing tools, most respondents reported using individual word processors and email as their main tools for writing joint documents. Respondents noted the importance of functions such as change tracking, version control, and synchronous work for collaborative writing tools. This study also confirmed the great variability that exists between collaborative writing projects, whether it be group membership, management, writing strategy, or scheduling issues.     

Literacy Sponsorship of the “My Online Friends” Discussion Board: Competing and Complementary Relationships

This article argues that we need to consider the complementary and competing relationships among the multiple types of sponsors of digital literacies. As we explore not just what people are reading and writing online, but also what sponsors fuel their motivations for doing so, we will have a better understanding of the constraints that accompany specific digital literacy opportunities, as well as what motivates individuals or groups to change their online reading and writing given these constraints.In this article, I discuss the relationships among the three commercial sponsors and one religious sponsor of the “My Online Friends” (MOF) discussion board, a group composed of approximately 120 women who are all members of the LDS, or Mormon, church. On the MOF discussion board, intersections among sponsors affect the women's establishment of group and individual identities and their use of relational literacy. In response to commercial sponsors’ coding and rules of use, which constrained the MOF women's religious and individual identity construction, the MOF women acted to change the commercial sponsorship of their spaces, yet they also adopted subject positions initially provided by commercial sponsors.     

Policy Matters Now and in the Future: Net Neutrality, Corporate Data Mining, and Government Surveillance

In this article, I will detail three key policy issues that have a profound effect on the future of the World Wide Web and Internet-based communications: net neutrality, corporate data mining, and government surveillance. Focusing on policy issues in the U.S., I will describe not only current practices and cases, but future possibilities for writers and teachers of writing. I will draw from work in composition, interdisciplinary studies on privacy, information sharing, and surveillance on the Internet, analyses of applicable policies and laws, and the advocacy efforts by organizations. Issues I will examine include the importance of and threats to net neutrality; how data mining and (so-called) privacy agreements currently work, specifically at social networking sites often used in writing classrooms; and how government and institutional surveillance is far more prevalent than many realize. I will close with recommendations for what writing instructors (and students) can do to try to craft a different future, one where writers and the visual, verbal, aural writing they read and produce online will not be collected, scrutinized, and controlled (or, realistically, at least not as much).