Discusses in cost/benefit terms an approach to teaching the sociology of religion which involves students in writing their religious autobiographies. Considers the nature of the assignment, level of methodological sophistication, difficulties in grading, and justification of the exercise. Concludes that the biographical approach has wide…

A fifth grader wanted to know what he had to do to get all his ideas the way he wanted them in his story writing "and" have the spelling, punctuation and quotation marks correctly styled. His teacher encouraged him to think about writing as a process and provided the student with three steps as guidelines for effective writing. (Author/RK)

Suggests grammatical problem solving, grammatical worksheets, and grammatical poetry as ways of helping students acquire grammatical fluency. (DD)

Just as spoken language is intended to be heard by an audience, written language aims to be read by an audience. In helping kids learn to write, teachers have ignored this crucial fact. The article discusses how a high school English teacher on the Navajo Indian Reservation got the students to do poetry and other creative writing. (Author/NQ)

Describes ways in which third and fourth grade students were introduced to language study by way of creative writing assignments. (HOD)

Several of the most common approaches to the preparation of more reflective teachers during pre-service teacher education are described. Specific strategies include: action research, ethnographic studies, writing exercises, and the Ohio State reflective teaching exercises. Empirical evidence concerning inquiry-oriented strategies is also…

Offers a nonverbal prewriting strategy, writer-based sketches, intended to help students turn their thoughts into words. (MS)

Illustrates the utility of composition classes to college juniors and seniors by having them interview someone in their future profession or career about the writing that person does on the job. (MS)

Describes a meditation assignment as a way for students to find connections between two levels of experience, the reader's level of transaction with the text and the level of the reader's own life. Leads students from close analysis to holistic consideration, and finally to philosophical implications. (MS)

Presents specific implications of writing research for teachers who work with gifted youngsters in elementary school writing. Supports the use of derived plot patterns and point of view as two types of literature-based writing assignments that work especially well with gifted students. (MS)

Recommends the use of a fictitious term paper with stringent format requirements, but without content, to enable students to concentrate on format. Emphasizes that the assignment gives students an opportunity to experience school as play. (MS)

Describes how a "strip story" activity (reassembling a text from strips of paper containing the text's sentences) develops reciprocity, the interaction between reading and writing as the reader negotiates a text and the writer assists the process. (MM)

Presents a memorandum report assignment involving the selection of magazines in students' major fields. (MS)

Presents an instructional unit, "Literary Lifeboat," a purposeful writing exercise in which students write character justifications for familiar stories. Describes the unit's implementation in a Year 5 class, and discusses the advantages and disadvantages of the exercise. (MM)

Presents an exercise for teachers which illustrates the limitations of workbook drills and rule study by teaching a brief hypothetical grammar text of five rules and exceptions, then employing those rules in standard drill exercises and a writing assignment. Claims that traditional pedagogies of formal grammar are not effective in improving…