The E-writing Approach to L2 Chinese Pedagogy: Educational Imperative and Empirical Evidence

In the digital age where mobile technologies are becoming ubiquitous and mediate communication locally and globally, it is necessary for L2 (Chinese) instruction to equip learners with the language skills needed to communicate in an ecologically valid and practical way, for example, by maximizing the connections between pedagogical tasks and real-world communication. In this chapter, I argue that shifting from current handwriting-focused pedagogical approaches to the e-writing (电写为主) approach, in which literacy and digital composition skills across multiple genres are developed in tandem with oral/aural communication skills, is critical for L2 Chinese pedagogy and programmes in the twenty-first century. To substantiate this educational imperative, I review the growing body of empirical evidence from L2 research, with a particular focus on Chinese as a foreign language. The rapidly developing research agenda on e-writing for L2 Chinese spans diverse areas of inquiry including vocabulary acquisition, interaction and feedback, writing assessment, emerging technologies, teacher and learner perceptions and programme and curriculum design. Following an overview of recent research developments, I outline potential action points for language teachers, programmes and other relevant stakeholders for gradually but purposefully adopting the e-writing approach.