Dynamics of computer-mediated communication in pair interactions
ESL pre-writing collaboration
Keywords:
computer-mediated communication, English as a second language, writing process, collaborationAbstract
The active use of technologies for communication in educational settings calls for a better understanding of the way learners engage in computer-mediated tasks. The current study aims to analyze the dynamics of pre-writing discussions in English as a Second language settings. The pre-writing discussions of 60 learners of intermediate level of proficiency were analyzed. The results of the study show that the students participate in the same task completion in a different manner depending on the mode of communication. These differences suggest that while the discussions completed in synchronous environments tend to be more collaborative, the posts were shorter and did not comprise complete sentences, in the asynchronous discussion on the other hand, the posts tended to share characteristics of outlines or drafts and students used longer strings of words often organized in complete sentences.
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