Describes an autobiography writing assignment. State that the resulting texts are entertaining, enlightening, and contain facts and anecdotes that reflect the personalities of the authors. (RS)

Describes a free writing exercise designed to help first-year college students confront perceptions they have of themselves as learners. (RS)

Argues that rationality follows rhetoric and emerges from discourse. Asserts that teachers must empower the students by starting with honest personal writing and move to honest personal writing about public issues. Presents samples of students' writing which illustrate the problems involved in trying to sound rational when arguing personal points.…

Argues that literature classes will grow more interesting and more effective if educators coordinate two kinds of emphases: allowing for discovery and moving toward productivity. Offers four principles for developing assignments: respect the process; nourish the participants; aim for a variety of products; and reflect together on process,…

Describes what business plans are and how educators can use them in class for a team writing assignment. (RS)

Describes adding lessons on stress management to the business communications classroom. (RS)

Describes how writing oral history can help students to feel that they are participating in a lively intellectual and cultural process that travels beyond the limits of the classroom. Says students claim that their obligations to the assignment are surpassed by their feelings of gratification in having created living works with lasting vitality.…

Offers suggestions on ways to include electronic mail skills in college classes, focusing on wide-area networks not on networks within a classroom. (SR)

Discusses various aspects of collaborative writing and advocates its use in college journalism courses. (SR)

Discusses and provides examples of seven types of columns for high school newspapers. (SR)

Examines several variables that may interact to affect the success of writing in science courses and provides some student views on these assignments. (PR)

Discusses how storytelling was used in a fifth-grade class as a tool for promoting literacy and language development by having children write and tell their own tales. Highlights the positive rewards for children. Includes suggestions and techniques for teachers to follow in their classrooms. (RS)

Presents a framework for third-grade writers and their partners called L.A.M.P. (Listening, Asking questions, Making suggestions, and Positive comments). Notes that the author uses this collaborative planning exercise periodically, not for every writing piece. (RS)

Describes two word games useful in secondary writing classrooms: "illot-mollo," in which freewriters announce words they just wrote which the other members must use in their subsequent freewriting; and "secret" in which students each write a secret (usually made-up) and then put them into a hat--students then pull out a secret and write about it.…

Describes a writing assignment in which students read only the first two paragraphs of Charles Dickens's novel "A Tale of Two Cities" and then, after some brainstorming and prewriting, write a paragraph or two modeled on those, explaining the confusion and turmoil of the present day. Notes how Dickens's expressions become more familiar…