1. The challenge of teaching academic writing online: developing report writing programs for science and engineering Helen Drury, Learning Centre, The University of Sydney

2. Why teach writing online? Program design –Theory –Practice Evaluation Issues Future directions Discussion Outline

3. Why teach writing online Key features: flexibility, self-paced instruction, multiple learner pathways New ways of learning about text, graphic/text interaction, new ways of writing But there are constraints ….

4. Program design : theory Draw on tried & tested approaches for redesigning ‘design takes the results of past production as the resource for new shaping and for remaking’ (Kress, 1997) SFL Multimodal research Genre-based literacy pedagogy (Martin, 1999) Model of language in context Make explicit to students writing practices of their disciplines Build a metalanguage to use in interactions with students and subject staff about language and how it means in a given context

5. Program design : theory phenomenography Focus on learners’ conceptions of subject matter Learning through interaction with on-screen teacher designs/concepts On-going ‘conversation’ between teacher and student concepts to achieve shared learning goal (Laurrilard, 2002) Learning takes place through languag e

6. Practice: History of WRiSE 19992003200620072009 Biology Authorware Report writing Internal Biochemistry Chemical Engineering Dreamweaver Report writing Internal Biochemistry 2 Dreamweaver Report writing Internal Physiology Flash Report writing Discipline content Internal Science and engineering Flash Report writing Discipline content External

7. SFL and WRiSE Martin, 2002 good to hear from people we knew, more real it had a sample introduction and then it highlighted each component of each part of the introduction that you needed, which was really good. for Chemistry, everything has to be so accurate, whereas with Chemical Engineering, you get marked down if you put too many significant figures it’s very important to show how your work refers to the rest of the field I find it ideal the way language is closely integrated into the material about the report structure. The other day I had a normally unruly class of 2nd year Chem Eng students enthralled in a cohesion exercise from the WRiSE site. need to be concise and use technical jargon, follow structure, proper tense, how to refer to figures, tables. Seeing those different colours is what helped me the most and, yep, I did change it. I wrote mine and then went to this site and looked at it and then went back and changed it.

8. Genre-based literacy pedagogy Martin, J. (1999) Mentoring semogenesis: ‘genre-based’ literacy pedagogy

9. How WRiSE deconstructs Building field Help with report writing : entry quiz Audio from students and staff on the context of the report and both the product and process Help with understanding content Blended learning Modelling Authentic student reports with lecturer feedback Example reports with student and lecturer comments Generic structure exemplified Discourse and language features exemplified Metalanguage introduced and exemplified some of those quizzes at the start I found a bit annoying conscious to only put relevant info in the report gave good example to compare my work with Having lectures on writing other than needing to access website as is not direct, can ask qs,maybe practise or more examples the lecturer explanations, easiest and most clear Example and comments made on example, breakdown of report sections Helped with how to use language and details of data

10. How WRiSE constructs Joint construction (with computer) Scaffolding through interactive exercises Feedback on exercises Independent construction Students write alongside WRiSE Feedback on drafts from lecturers in eportfolio I think it helped a lot for me, writing in my second language, learned a lot from the exercises I went over it all, by then I had an idea and then I started writing

11. How was the site used Semester, 2009 Total Pageviews57303 Average Pageviews Per Day585 Average Pageviews Per Session7 Average Length of Session (mins)11 Total Unique Visitors964 Average Unique Visitors Per Day12 Total Unique Visitor Sessions8275 Average Unique Visitor Sessions Per Day100

12. Weekly usage

13. Questionnaire Data n=417 F=173 M=190 1: Didn’t know about it5: Forgot 2: Didn’t need it6: Used other source 3: No time7: Lazy 4: No internet/problems with internet8: No comment 42% of students surveyed did not use the site

14. Language background users v. non-users

15. Writing experience users v. non-users equally confident in their writing tasks no difference in the types of academic texts previously produced in general, more participants who used WRiSE had written longer academic texts than those who did not

16. Using WRiSE

17. Improved understanding I used it on the structure, mainly what to put where, I tend to blur my results in discussion a little bit. After I wrote it I went back and looked at it and kind of pasted a few things of what I wrote. I used the seven Is, I read through those so I included a bit more with that. Before using it I was lost as to where I should start....allowed me to further understand the specific requirements...

18. Improved confidence If you were really organised and you set aside two weeks just for the report, like every night, this site would be perfect for it. It’s not a really good site for cramming. I feel more comfortable at following structure I can explain myself clearly and am able to identify mistakes and correct..

19. ...almost all students did well on the structure of the report. All was good there and many did a reasonable attempt at the Summary and Conclusion sections. So perhaps WRiSE did succeed...strongly encouraged to use the site. Quite an improvement I feel we definitely have a well-designed, pedagogically sound website. Informal feedback from PhD demonstrators who mark the reports indicate meaningful improvements in student report writing skills Staff Comments

20. Does WRiSE make a difference? On average, report marks of those who used the website (M =.13, SD =.97, n = 204) were significantly higher than those who did not use the website (M = -.19, SD =.98, n = 144); t(306) = -3.02, p =.01.

21. Constraints of the screen –Using authentic texts –Using large/whole texts Constraints of an online learning environment –Writing tasks and exercises –Scaffolding student understanding –Getting lost Blended learning –Implementation and integration –Motivation for students to use the site Division between language and content Critical/challenging orientation to the genre Issues Once you were inside a module, there was actually a tiny little menu right down the bottom, it would be nicer if you could navigate more easily

22. Towards a community of practice Training and experience with Question tools are very helpful indeed, a deeper consideration of student report writing is also valuable New working relationships and collaborative links with colleagues across the University - thankyou for the opportunity to be involved in this exciting project

23. Future directions

24. Learning Centre Janet Jones, Helen Drury, Peter O’Carroll Discipline Teams Peter McGee, Vanessa Gysbers, Dale Hancock Jill Johnston Tim Langrish, Howard See Meloni Muir Peter Rutledge David Airey Technical Team Aida Yalcin, Kathy Kuzmanov, Richard Massey Research Assistant Natassia Goode Acknowledgements Learning Centre Sue Starfield, Pam Mort Discipline Teams Paul Hagan, John Wilson, Kathy Takayama, Rosanne Quinnell, Rebecca LeBard Reference Group Peter Goodyear Robert Ellis Michelle Kofod Rosemary Clerehan

25. www.usyd.edu.au/learningcentre/wrise

26. Discussion Questions 1.Where and how are collaborations working best between writing specialists and teaching academics in the disciplines given students with varying levels of competency? 2.What are the implications of the above for a language based approach to teaching and learning at tertiary level in both formal and informal settings? 3.How do we do a language based approach with large cohorts?