In the fall semester of 1995, we designed a Freshman Composition course to be taught over the Internet. In the spring of 1996, we taught our first, test class. Based on the argument that writers largely learn to write by writing, the course was designed to permit students maximum written interactivity. Threaded discussions were topical and continuous.

Strengths

Student writing skills improved very quickly. Students who seemed to come into class simi-literate, tended to leave with significant improvement. We felt that this was a very powerful learning environment.

Generally speaking, the students enjoyed the course a great deal. Because they were writing on topics that interested them, they wrote lengthy and interesting postings.

Upon graduating, one hearing impaired student rated this as the best class she took during her entire undergraduate career.

Problems

A surprising number of students were concerned about whether they actually learned anything. Because the course seemed too easy (simply chatting) , the students were concerned that they had missed something important. One student, even wrote a letter of complaint.

Conclusions

Although the results were interesting and promising, we are not researching education at this level, so future investigation was dropped. We still believe, however, that an online, freshman English course based solely on written chatter might be the most powerful learning environment for new writers.

Publications

The paper, "View From a Height: Problems in Online Education" was presented in the 1997 Conference of Computers and Writing, Honolulu.

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