An approach in which advanced language students construct their own dictionaries in class combines vocabulary development with development of a metalanguage. The procedures used in the classroom exercise are outlined and illustrated, and examples of students' personalized dictionaries are presented. (MSE)

A series of French language classroom exercises to be used over four class sessions applies principles of semiotics to literary textual analysis. The session themes include decoding and interpreting, reconstructing meaning, sociocultural connotations in the text, and sense of time and space. (MSE)

Describes a practical classroom application of contextual factors, ease-of-use factors, and document design criteria. Offers an assignment which introduces students to the relationship between research and its implementation in document development. (PRA)

A Polish technique for second-language instruction among young children uses playful activities, particularly drawing and coloring, alongside dialogues for effective language learning. In a cooperative exercise, students create their own books using their own art and newly learned vocabulary. (MSE)

Describes a simple eight-step technique for teaching poetry that introduces poetry from the standpoint of writing it and by changing prose to poetry. (SR)

Describes how children in a second-grade classroom collaborate to write classbooks for every conceivable reason. Notes that these books are a very popular take-home item. (SR)

Teachers can help elementary students cope at the beginning of the school year by assisting them in getting to know one another. Writing is a good tool for bridging the gap between personal and school lives. The article suggests writing activities and explains how to create a good writing environment. (SM)

Describes some exploratory and discovery methods which capture interest, stimulate curiosity, and kindle enthusiasm of students as they approach Shakespeare and decide how it should be acted, interpreted, and staged. (SR)

Notes that an earlier article in this journal introduced the process of building fluency in a language such as German by having students work through a set of procedures that touch on all communication skills. Shows how students can move from these beginning experiences to establish further control over the language. (RS)

Describes the affinities between reader response theory and the proper objectives of English instruction. Describes students not as potential literary scholars but as curious people needing personal experiences with reading and writing. Outlines a model for teaching literature focused on this conception. (HB)

Describes a sentence expansion technique found to be an effective and motivating way to teach sentence structure and vocabulary to elementary school students. (SR)

Describes a class project in which students write a detailed story of their family heritage and how they came to live in the United States. Notes that students also paint murals telling the story of their family and present the story and the mural on videotape. Presents four such stories and murals. (RS)

Describes a way to enliven vocabulary lessons by combining them with two effective teaching strategies--cooperative learning and story development by students. (SR)

Discusses the apparent chaos of two student activities in a seventh-grade reading and writing workshop in the light of physicists' recent theories of time. Show how time is thought to be organic and evolving, with the past active in the present, and with students using time not in a linear way but as a whole. (SR)

Discusses the definition of cooperative learning; cooperative-learning groups and learning disabilities; cooperative-learning methods used in reading and in writing; and perspectives on cooperative-learning groups. (RS)