Although peer reviewing of writing is a way to create more writing opportunities in college and university settings, the validity and reliability of peer-generated grades are a major concern. This study investigated the validity and reliability of peer-generated writing grades of 708 students across 16 different courses from 4 universities in a particular scaffolded reviewing context: Students were given guidance on peer assessment, used carefully constructed rubrics, and were provided clear incentives to take the assessment task seriously. Distinguishing between instructor and student perspectives of reliability and validity, the analyses suggest that the aggregate ratings of at least 4 peers on a piece of writing are both highly reliable and as valid as instructor ratings while (paradoxically) producing very low estimates of reliability and validity from the student perspective. The results suggest that instructor concerns about peer evaluation reliability and validity should not be a barrier to implementing peer evaluations, at least with appropriate scaffolds. Future research needs to investigate how to address student concerns about reliability and validity and to identify scaffolds that may ensure high levels of reliability and validity.

Social work tutors and practice teachers are under increasing pressure to better prepare students for practice in the area of child care and protection, however, little attention has been given to the role of feedback in this process. This study uses a content analysis of written feedback from tutors and interviews to examine students' experiences of feedback on a social work course. Findings suggest there is considerable variation in the extent, type and source of feedback in student learning about child care and protection. Students consider feedback to be most effective when it is formative and delivered by an experienced practice teacher during the practice placement. The key factors which mediate upon student experiences of feedback are: the personal and emotive nature of the instruction; the expertise of practice teachers and learning opportunities on placement; and, the quality of relationships between the giver and receiver of feedback. These factors are not exclusive to a particular source or type of feedback. The task for tutors and practice teachers is getting the right balance of factors across the different types and sources of feedback, aligning it with the teaching and learning process and empowering students to participate in feedback practices.

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This article concerns the curriculum of computer literacy (CL). A strong sense of technical necessity informs the design of the CL curriculum, and as a result, instruction is inadequate at best and dehumanizing at worst. CL curriculum and instruction are informed by a sense of technical determinism and a particular form of masculinity. This article draws mainly from the sociology of education, supplemented by personal observation. The article has two implications. First, to reduce the failure and frustration that many feel as they attempt to become computer literate, greater attention ought to be given in CL curriculum design to the concept of learning as enculturation and to cognitive context. Second, to counter the sense of necessity that leads designers and others to ignore culture and context, the formal CL curriculum must give serious attention to the social construction of educational technology/technique, especially the influence of gender. Technique and NecessityIn The Technological Society, Jacques Ellul defines technique as &dquo;the totality of methods rationally arrived at and having absolute deficiency (for a given stage of development) in every field of human activity&dquo; (cited in Otto, 1975, p. 7). Later, perhaps chastened by criticism of his earlier definition, Ellul (1972) says that &dquo;technique is an ensemble of rational and efficient practices; a collection of orders, schemas, and mechanisms&dquo; (p. 91). What Ellul calls &dquo;La Technique&dquo; might also be described as an emergent, system-level property or dynamic related to, but distinguished from, particular techniques as ordinarily understood. According to Ellul, it is in the nature of contemporary technique to be taken as &dquo;the one best way&dquo; of apprehending and reforming the world. In the arresting phrase of one commentator, &dquo;the necessity of tech-

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