Engaging students with collaborative digital multimodal composing in an EFL classroom

Purpose: In the evolving digital landscape, digital multimodal composing (DMC) has emerged as a promising pedagogical practice in second language classrooms. Despite its potential to enhance educational outcomes, little is known about how students engage with DMC projects to improve their writing and learning. This article examines the implementation of collaborative DMC as an innovative practice that transforms the traditional reliance on monomodal texts in many Chinese EFL classrooms, with the aim of enhancing students' engagement to promote their learning and writing.Methods: Drawing on data collected from multiple sources, including students' DMC drafts and editing records, semi–structured interviews, reflective journals, and classroom documents, this qualitative study explored how a cohort of Chinese EFL undergraduates engaged behaviorally, cognitively, and affectively with collaborative DMC projects.Results: Findings indicate that collaborative DMC served as a motivating and engaging tool for EFL students, fostering their behavioral, cognitive, and affective engagement. Specifically, students actively invested time and undertook task–related actions (e.g., leveraged various resources for thoughtful revisions), employed metacognitive strategies to deepen their cognitive engagement, and experienced learning gains as well as a range of emotions that enriched their affective engagement.Originality: This investigation contributes to our understanding of the role of DMC in second language learning and offers valuable implications for classroom practices.