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A digital environment for instructional purposes has been adopted in the form of a Learning Management System (LMS) by educational institutions. The present study facilitates incorporation of online writing tutorials over LMS 'Nalanda' BITS Pilani with the objective of understanding the nature of the writing process while students accomplish their writing tasks on online forums. A paragogical framework has also been devised by keeping scaffolding as the theoretical basis of learning. The methodological strategy adopted to realize the objective and analyze the impact of the educational intervention was content analysis. Results of the content analysis, under the parameters corresponding to different stages of the writing process, suggest that students' emphasis had been more on content development and critical thinking.

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The art of constructing an assertive argument is a crucial lifelong skill for law students to master. The English language teachers at Bennett University Law School introduce the topic of argumentative essay writing to its first-year law undergraduates and teach the basic structure of an argument in a standard five paragraph argumentative essay and then gradually elaborate on the content. The pedagogy makes use of the online platforms of i-Learn learning management and Clarity English programs (customised English language teaching software) to engage students in essay writing tutorials. The study analyses how the students develop the understanding of framing a strong argument and move towards attaining appropriation in it. This was done by comparing pre-test and post-test results of the control and experimental groups and by content analysis of the transcripts. The target group in the study included 120 students of BA LLB (Hons) who are divided into control and experimental groups. The study also tries to figure out the comparative advantage of classroom teaching in physical settings, online group discussions on i-Learn forums, and individual practice sessions on Study Skills Success and the Practical Writing program offered by Clarity English. This was done through student survey analysis. The overall data involved pre-test and post-test essay writing transcripts, online discussion forum transcripts on i-Learn, and student surveys. This educational intervention is an attempt to assess and design the best teaching practice with available resources for teaching argumentative essay writing to law undergraduates.

Like any other discipline, academic writing is equally crucial for law undergraduates to master. Project reports, argumentative essay writing on current socio-legal affairs and research paper writing comprise requisites in academia for law learners. Students’ appropriation of higher order concerns in academic writing is a major challenge for teachers, as the physical classroom discourse community is typically passive and does not give enough opportunities to students to think critically about their writing processes. The teacher is expected to provide feedback to students on their writing, which often leads to the creation of only one feedback centre, restriction of the scope for varied perceptions and formation of multiple small discourses where the teacher is the central point of reference in every discourse. Consequentially, students can fail to develop self/peer-critiques in the ongoing discourse. The present paper has its focus on the recreation of discourse communities using a learning management system at the Law School, Bennett University, India, to promote peer-to-peer learning for honing higher order concerns in academic writing. The paper investigates how law students behave whilst interacting in a recreated online discourse community, benefit through peer feedback, and enhance their knowledge of the academic writing genre of argumentative essays, its subject matter and rhetoric involved. The methodological triangulation of pre-test/post-test analysis, student survey and conceptual content analysis of students’ interaction transcripts support recreation of online discourse communities in academic writing instruction.