This paper reflects on the ways in which traditional notions of literacy are being challenged by new technologies, arguing that alongside a re-conceptualization of literacy, educators need to re-think literacy curriculum content and their approaches to teaching. Taking a view of literacy as a social practice, it discusses how increasing numbers of people in technologically rich environments are taking opportunities to produce complex digital texts as part of their everyday life.

The article sought to compare the performance of online and traditional face-to-face students who were identically assessed in two graduate courses offered concurrently in the two modes. It hypothesised that there was no significant difference between the achievement levels of online and face-to-face students across years in two separate graduate courses. The study utilised an ex post facto design and used archival data on the final assessment scores of students. The findings suggest that the face-to-face students tended to perform at a higher level than the online students.