The data in the studies were collected by the author and colleagues of the author. The author was responsible for all phases of processing data and the data analysis. The author is familiar with the educational setting and student body through experience as a teacher of ESP courses as well as web-based environments.
In order to explore student activities taking place in the web-based envi- ronments, the student postings, both on the web pages as well as in the ver- sion handling system of the web pages were scrutinized. The investigation of the student postings took place after the termination of each course.
The analysis of the student activities was based on a close examination of the student postings. Through the fact that the activities were performed by means of web-based technology it was possible to follow the develop- ment of the student activities from the sequential organization of the post- ings.
The procedure for the analysis in the studies was categorizing the logged content into the forms of activities that the students were engaged in throughout the entire participation, from the first to last posting. In this way, the activities were scrutinized in the order that they appeared on the platform. Following an initial examination of the postings in their entirety, in the studies, each posting was scrutinized in detail, investigating the post- ings of each individual contributor and group in chronological order. The texts were systematically coded, tagged, and sorted into categories related to prominent, recurrent features and commonly distinguishable items in the postings. In the wiki version handling, green text indicates inserted new contributions, red indicates deletion, and white text implies unchanged text from the previous version. Since each contribution was traceable it was pos- sible to follow the trail of a specific item and how it was intertwined with other items. The analysis is thus based on the formation of posted content developed by the participants. The data for each study was collected and analyzed before the next study was performed.
For the analysis of the student production in study four, the text assign- ment comments were categorized according to division of type, area and nature of comments (Liu and Sadler, 2003). In order to analyze the inter-
views, they were first transcribed verbatim and tagged according to what was topicalized by the students. Having both the student text comments and the interviews, gave two complementary sources of data, since the categorization of the text assignments gave an overview of the aspects of posted peer review and the interviews gave an insight into the student reflections of peer reviewing.
of view, scrutinizing the meaning from their experiences (Kvale & Brink- mann, 2009). In line with prior studies of web-based collaboration for language learning purposes, the interviews were used as a complementary method (cf. Dippold, 2009; Lee, 2010) in combination with the method of online entries in the form of web-based activities. Each interview lasted for approximately 30 minutes.
Kvale (1996) has thoroughly discussed the interview setting and quality criteria applicable for interviews. One such criterion is keeping questions short and instead allowing for the subjects’ to elaborate. Another central criterion is that the interviewer verifies the interpretation of the subjects’ answers during the course of the interview. The setting triggered coherent accounts and descriptions by the students. It allowed for the students to feel free to reflect on the peer response situation.
The interviews were performed as an interactive dialogue with open- ended questions during the course of the peer collaboration as well as a follow up procedure after termination of the research project. The students were thus interviewed twice, in the middle of the exchange and after the completion of the exchange. Setting up the interviews twice facilitated cap- turing the student reflections while they were still topical. The interviews were aimed at displaying student reflections of the peer review procedure of giving as well as receiving peer response. The students were provided with the commented texts that the students had both given to their peers as well as received from their peer students. The questions were in the form of prompts opening up for the student to recall the comment work pro- cedure. The same questions were posed in the first as well as in the second interview.
DATA ANALYSIS
The data in the studies were collected by the author and colleagues of the author. The author was responsible for all phases of processing data and the data analysis. The author is familiar with the educational setting and student body through experience as a teacher of ESP courses as well as web-based environments.
In order to explore student activities taking place in the web-based envi- ronments, the student postings, both on the web pages as well as in the ver- sion handling system of the web pages were scrutinized. The investigation of the student postings took place after the termination of each course.
The analysis of the student activities was based on a close examination of the student postings. Through the fact that the activities were performed by means of web-based technology it was possible to follow the develop- ment of the student activities from the sequential organization of the post- ings.
The procedure for the analysis in the studies was categorizing the logged content into the forms of activities that the students were engaged in throughout the entire participation, from the first to last posting. In this way, the activities were scrutinized in the order that they appeared on the platform. Following an initial examination of the postings in their entirety, in the studies, each posting was scrutinized in detail, investigating the post- ings of each individual contributor and group in chronological order. The texts were systematically coded, tagged, and sorted into categories related to prominent, recurrent features and commonly distinguishable items in the postings. In the wiki version handling, green text indicates inserted new contributions, red indicates deletion, and white text implies unchanged text from the previous version. Since each contribution was traceable it was pos- sible to follow the trail of a specific item and how it was intertwined with other items. The analysis is thus based on the formation of posted content developed by the participants. The data for each study was collected and analyzed before the next study was performed.
For the analysis of the student production in study four, the text assign- ment comments were categorized according to division of type, area and nature of comments (Liu and Sadler, 2003). In order to analyze the inter-
views, they were first transcribed verbatim and tagged according to what was topicalized by the students. Having both the student text comments and the interviews, gave two complementary sources of data, since the categorization of the text assignments gave an overview of the aspects of posted peer review and the interviews gave an insight into the student reflections of peer reviewing.