Students sometimes respond to writing assignments automatically, almost as if they were a generic form, rather than by investigating the idiosyncrasies and unexpected possibilities of each assignment. Writing assignments can be structured to help students transcend such habits, shifting the focus from accumulating information to creating meaning…

States that language arts teachers should be agents for personal growth and development. Suggests using an extensive poetry project as as avenue to personal transformation. (EL)

Writing teachers can enable students to think critically by teaching composition courses according to two principles: sequencing and revision. The teaching of a basic reading and writing course for college freshmen illustrates how writing, taught from a discovery perspective and in conjunction with selected readings, can develop students' ability…

William G. Perry, Jr.'s, ideas on the development of student writers were used as a frame of reference for a study of the discursive development of students enrolled in writing seminars at Skidmore College (New York). Perry posits that students execute a series of maneuvers in which they first try to assimilate new perspectives they are…

Explores what creative drama is, why it should be included in the teaching of both expository and creative writing, and how language arts teachers can implement creative drama activities to increase student success in writing and to improve learning. Describes how using creative drama to enhance creative writing restores authority to students for…

This book discusses research on learning to talk, read, and write and explores activities to support the development of these crucial competencies. The book's discussion of research is divided into two chapters: "Supporting Early Literacy: The Preschool Years" and "Supporting Early Literacy: The Primary Years." Following the two chapters on…

Calling for a radical reexamination of the traditional foundation of composition instruction--the thesis/support form, this book argues that the essay, with its informality, conversational tone, meditative mood, and integration of form and content, is better suited to developmental, epistemological, ideological, and feminist rhetorical…

Intended for teachers, reading specialists, administrators, students in teacher education programs, and parents, this book contains descriptions of strategies for fostering emergent literacy and steps for carrying them out. An underlying theme is the merging of the art and the science of teaching. Chapters in the book begin with questions to focus…

Presents three activities designed motivate student journal writing as a way to help students confront personal fears and open dialogue between troubled students and teachers. (HTH)

Aimed at primary-age children, this book brings William Shakespeare's "Twelfth Night" to them, recognizing that children, properly guided, will take to Shakespeare's characters and stories like "ducks to water"; in the process they find their inner voices, they collaborate, they improvise, and they communicate. Illustrated with…

Reports on two case studies of writing development in the primary grades. Notes the impact of teacher's questioning techniques, both on student development as writers and on teacher ability to evaluate student progress. (RL)

Describes an assignment sequence using photographs to introduce developmental students to conventions of academic inquiry, and to give them practice analyzing and synthesizing. Reports that students link details observed in the photos to inferences drawn about them. Concentrates on the assignment linking a photo of E. B. White with an essay by him…

This book is intended for middle and high school teachers who are committed to the process-writing model and are eager to encourage their students in the last step of the process--publication. The book offers specific writing ideas and classroom activities that help students develop the confidence and ability to publish in a wide market, and it…

One of a number of reports of a study of the writing development of 14- to 16-year-old students, this booklet is divided into two parts. The first part uses five criteria to analyze what four secondary students learn from composing imaginary stories: (1) What resources are used in the setting or situation? (2) What kind of ordering is used? (3)…

Transcripts of writing conferences and of interviews with students illustrate both the changes in the way students evaluate writing and the teaching strategies that sharpen evaluative skills. (RL)