Teaching Word Processors to Be CAI Programs

Abstract

Many composition teachers searching for pedagogically sound ways to use computers in their classes look down vistas of instructional software for some ultimate program out there in some promised land-and discover programs that are huge, complex, expensive, and not accessible at most schools. They may, however, be wandering in an electronic wilderness. Perhaps they should settle firmly into the familiar territory of their own word processors, secure in the fact that they can prosper there. For many teachers of writing, however, not only is their word processor not familiar territory, it's often more or less unexplored territory. They've been intimidated by writers in the field of computers and composition who either encourage a belief that most word processors are far more complex and sophisticated than the typical writing student requires (Collier 154) or who discourage exploration by setting up false dichotomies between CAI programs and word processors: [B]oth [word processing programs and erasable ball-point pens] are really just tools for doing something. But instructional computer materials are tools for and learning something (Southwell 223). Helen Schwartz comes closest to stating what ought to be the proper relationship between word processing and teaching and learning something: