Creating a Virtual Literacy Community between High School and University Students

Abstract

The authors of this chapter describe a project in which a university education professor and a high school English teacher redesigned the curricula of their classrooms, so their students could participate in a literacy project that focused on computer-mediated discussions of literature. The goal of the project was to develop both the technological literacies of these students and the more traditional literacies in the form of reading and writing skills. The Book Buddy Project afforded the authors the opportunity to create a virtual literacy community in which high school and university students incorporated the traditional literacies of reading and writing within a virtual environment that facilitated communication, collaboration, and learning with text.