I believe that growing writers need opportunities to share their work with others.  Sharing work with teachers is not enough, especially if the only communication the receive from the teacher in return is comments about their use of form or conventions.  They need to feel validated as writers and they need to experience the written word as a medium for communication.  Such experiences help them to become more aware of how subject, audience, and purpose effect a writer's decisions.  Such experiences help them see the logic behind the rules they are being taught.  And, such experiences provide a crucial motivator for learning to write --- sharing their work gives them a reason to write. 

For these reasons, I try to provide as many opportunities for my students to share their work whenever possible.  One of the ways I have created these opportunities is by helping them to create their own webpages.  From what I've seen, students generally find this very motivating.  It's like a whole new world is opening up to them.  Not only do they feel like they are joining a community of writers, but they also feel that they are joining a virtual community of technologically up-to-date people.  When the classwork is to build their own webpages, some students spend way more time doing their work.  Students who never paid attention to form and convention suddenly become very concerned about it.  Students who never did their homework before start doing it.