Using Online Argument Role-Play to Foster Learning to Argue and Arguing to Learn in a High School Composition Class by Richard Beach

I describe the use of online role-play in a 12th grade high school composition class using a class blog and a Ning forum. In a role-play, students adopt fictional roles associated with competing positions associated with influencing a final decision on an issue. Students were highly engaged in a Ning role-play on the issue of student Internet access in their school because they were assuming different voices, writing to multiple audiences versus just the teacher, and developing arguments to make proposals for actual changes in the school’s Internet policies.