To Örebro University

The aim of this thesis is to investigate the writing process in the teaching of the subject of Swedish at upper secondary school. This study analyses the relations between the pupils’ writing and the school environment in which the writing takes place and how the pupils position themselves and others in relation to their use of digital artefacts and norms in the classroom. The empirical material has been created in three classes at two different schools. The data consists of participant observations of 42 lessons, all of which were video recorded using two cameras, and audio recorded semi-structured interviews with 24 pupils and 3 teachers. Theoretically, the study is based on sociocultural perspectives on literacy and learning and a multimodal social semiotic understanding of meaning-making based on an interest in the use of resources that constitute meaning in the social environment. From an ecological perspective, writing is examined as discourses in which the participants and the environment interact. Analytic concepts are used by inspiration from Kress et al (2005) and Smidt (2002). The figure “Writing roles in fields of tension” has been constructed to illustrate the students’ writing roles and positioning's in the empirical material. The results show that the shift from paper and pen to computer and screen means more than a shift change in the use of artefacts. The teaching of digital writing has a point of departure as a project in communication. In multimodal environments, pupils are often left without access to a teacher due to the layout of the room. This leads to positioning in roles, such as help seeker and helper. The classrooms are characterised by the constant presence of social media and its demands on students’ attention. Earlier generations of writing processes emphasised the importance of prewriting, drafting and revision in stages. In the digital writing process these stages are lacking. In this context, the digital writing process can be understood as a “fourth generation process” consisting of writing, saving and sending. The fourth generation of writing process stresses on the writing at a micro- rather than macro level. The word processing functions of spelling and grammar offer clickable solutions to problems, but cannot be considered as tools for learning. In the digital classroom pupils are vulnerable, left to their own resources and have difficulties in handling complex assignments.