Compares the preferred prewriting invention strategies of advanced, average, and basic ability eleventh grade writers. Finds that freewriting was used most frequently by the total group of students as well as when advanced students' and average students' responses were considered separately. Includes comparisons of preferences by level of student…

Discusses five writing exercises to improve teachers' and students' writing. Suggests using the exercises once a day. (RS)

Discusses the efforts of a fifth-grade teacher and a visiting poet to rekindle students' sense of poetic passion and pleasure. Describes how the authors introduced students to poems for two voices (using P. Fleischman's "Joyful Noise"). The poetry unit culminated in a project in which students read and performed Fleischman's poems, then wrote and…

Aims for students to explore spontaneous ways of finding material for their poems by suppressing control over their subject matter and letting their unconscious minds do the work. Uses a poem of William Carlos Williams, "Red Wheelbarrow," both with K-2 students and adults in a poetry workshop. Illustrates class procedures and activities…

Presents five short teaching tips written by five different authors on the following topics: newspapers, writing exercises for aspiring elementary school teachers, telephone directory as research tool, structured essay assignments, and teaching description with Raymond Carver's "Cathedral." (TB)

Shows how the regular reading and discussion of rich literary passages builds a respect and interest among students for imagery. Describes a series of classroom exercises designed to build imagery writing skills. (TB)

This monograph presents in some detail the ways in which Faculty Institutes--professional development opportunities where instructors immerse themselves in site-specific learning activities exactly as students would, though only for several days--allow participants to acquire the skill to design such adventures elsewhere for their own students.…

The report summarizes relevant high-quality research studies and synthesizes their findings to determine the relative effectiveness of interventions for struggling early readers. Additionally, the authors outline the implications of these findings for practice. Specific suggestions for implementing the findings are discussed in detail beginning on…

Encouraging exploration and practice, this book offers hundreds of exercises and numerous tips covering every step involved in creating poetry. Each chapter is a self-contained unit offering an overview of material in the chapter, a definition of terms, and poetry examples from well-known authors designed to supplement the numerous exercises.…

Helping business students to communicate better, this book addresses approaches and techniques for planning messages and selecting media, discusses a broad range of business writing situations, and covers key situations most managers would face on the job. Exercises in the book were written at two levels of difficulty (those applying basic…

Offering the notion of writing pedagogy as a "bazaar with many booths," this collection of articles on teaching creative writing is focused on applicability to all levels of instruction. The 10 articles, after a Foreword by the editor, are, as follows: "Before Writing: Remember What Makes Writing Easy" (Donald M. Murray);…

Defining the genre of creative nonfiction as where writing and journalistic reporting merge, this guide shows that aspiring journalists, essayists, and biographers do not need to stifle their creativity to succeed in the craft of writing. The guide teaches young writers how to use creative nonfiction to its full effect, writing the truth in a way…

Epideictic rhetoric, expression of praise or blame, animates much communication, from gossip to sermons, from commercial ads to love letters. Even when writing for purposes other than to judge, writers often frame their talk with implicit or explicit expressions of praise for individuals or groups or ideas considered "good." Epideictic…

Stephen Tchudi, among others, argues that the distinction between expository writing and creative writing is finally a false distinction. Louise Rosenblatt explains that whether readers are reading creative writing or expository writing, they expect the experience of reading to provide them with both information and pleasure. A corollary of these…

This collection of materials, a summary of a workshop, is divided into five sections, framed by introductory and concluding remarks. The sections are: (1) a panel on "What Is the Domain Beyond?"--panelists discussed their particular interests in areas that could not be traditionally classified as "cognitive" and related those…