This paper outlines the procedures used in, and evaluates the success of, a pilot writers' group for MA-level academic writers. After some background on writers' groups is provided, the activities used in a pilot Writer Development (WD) Workshop, along with the rationale behind the activities, will be described. The usefulness of the activities will then be evaluated from the viewpoint of the studentwriters. Results indicate that along with social and affective benefits, the members perceived academic merit in being involved in the group. Most members experienced, at the very least, a heightened awareness of individual writing processes, and of feedback practices and preferences. The activities in the workshops seemed to help the members develop themselves as writers, and an improvement in the quality of written product was perceived by the writers themselves.

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Feedback: The Communication of Praise, Criticism, and Advice Robbie M. Sutton, Matthew J. Hornsey and Karen M. Douglas (eds.) (2012) New York: Peter Lang International Academic Publishers. Pp. 359 ISBN: 9781433105111

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This paper outlines the development of the "Reader Engagement framework", a tool for helping emerging writers understand what might keep readers reading-or stop readers from reading-a text. The Reader Engagement framework has been under development for the past five years, primarily in the context of undergraduate English proficiency classes at a large university in Flanders. Using the principles of constructivist grounded theory (Charmaz 2014), a preliminary framework was sketched using as data the margin comments of one reader who noted points of engagement or disengagement while reading student texts. Additional rounds of data collection included the engagement perceptions of student-readers, as well as those of teacher-readers from various disciplines. Thus far 1087 readers have been consulted, and the categories in the framework seem to be largely saturated. Though further refinement is necessary, the framework has been found successful as a teaching tool, and as an assessment and feedback tool. It also seems to have potential for offering writers a new way of conceptualising writing.