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Current views of literacy have expanded to encompass how individuals in sociocultural systems make meaning as they ''read'' and ''write'' their world. From this view, the work of students involved in pursuing deeper understandings as they discuss course concepts is a literacy act. This study focused on the inquiry and questioning moves of graduate students as they participated in nine online classroom discussions about course concepts. A coding scheme adapted from several researchers interested in inquiry and knowledge co-construction was applied to the students' comments posted in synchronous online discussion. Findings indicated that students used various inquiry moves to engage actively with course ideas, with some moves more popular than others, and with some students using a wider variety of moves than others. Although the most common moves were of those reacting to others' comments with an interpretation, supporting evidence, or more thoroughly explaining a previously shared idea, threads often developed into more sophisticated inquiry exchanges through ''inferences'' and ''critical evaluations.'' Implications are offered for the use of

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Virtual worlds for language learning introduces language educators and researchers to a new educational space, one in which the affordances of virtual worlds (VWs) are connected to language learning. The six chapters of the book highlight aspects of VWs to facilitate readers' general understanding of VWs, emphasize the educational potential of VWs from pedagogical and theoretical perspectives for language learning, introduce exemplary features and usages of VW software, and conclude with possible research applications and future directions of VWs with a list of resources.