This essay explores what the development of writing might look like and how it might take shape in a secondary English classroom. The study problematises current definitions of progress. In direct opposition to standards-driven models, I propose an alternative way of thinking about the development of writers through a series of narrative accounts…

Argumentation is one of the central practices in science learning and helps deepen students' conceptual understanding. Students should learn how to communicate ideas including procedure tests, data interpretations, and investigation outcomes in verbal and written forms through argument structure. This article presents a negotiation model to…

A successful middle school team of teachers employed effective middle level philosophy to structure a curriculum around themes that were relevant, challenging, integrative, and engaging for their particular students and community. Realizing that their young adolescents were involved in tough, delicate issues in their out-of-school lives, the…

This article describes the author's experience co-facilitating a project for which seventh-grade students designed and created original video games based on Madeleine L'Engle's "A Wrinkle in Time". The author provides an overview of recent literature on video game implementation in the classroom and explains how the project was designed and…

A classroom teacher reflects on the benefits of professional development leading to improved and energized student writing. Although traditional professional development sparked interest and encouraged modifications, the support of a teacher inquiry group as ongoing professional development provided the impact needed to effect significant change…

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)

The results of this paper are drawn from interviews with the school principal and the music teacher of a secondary school in Shanghai, China, together with an analysis of 24 seventh-grade students' written assignments entitled "I and Music." These assignments reveal rich and varied connections between the students' social contexts and…

Offers a humorous account of a writing assignment in which seventh-grade students, in response to a detailed description of a living room, wrote descriptions of who lived there, much to the chagrin of their teacher, whose living room it was. (SR)

Describes how a teacher integrated an audio cassette version of a Ray Bradbury story into a computer-supported creative writing project in her seventh-grade literature class. (SR)

Grounded in integrated and excerpt style (Emerson, et al., 1995), this article chronicles Mr. Lehrer, an English teacher who provides his students access to standard and nonstandard writing conventions. Student writing samples and discursive practices illustrate enhanced awareness of distinctions between nonstandard language (African American…

Presents a lesson plan for seventh-grade students in which they learn respect for themselves and others and apply social studies skills. Explains that the students create timelines, interview someone of an older generation, and create a Venn diagram comparing that person's life to their own. Includes suggestions for writing assignments based on…

Describes seven different written response formats (which all use reading response strategies) used with seventh graders. Discusses how the formats improve the quality of thinking put forth in students' responses to their self-selected adolescent novels. Discusses which response formats illicit more higher-level thinking. (SR)

Describes how seventh graders were given a writing activity, collaboratively created by teachers and librarians utilizing a computer program, to introduce cumulative tales. Details the process of identifying characteristics of cumulative tales, teaching as a team, writing the tale, recording the tale on the computer, and sharing cumulative tales.…

Describes an exploration the author and his seventh-grade students undertook as they wrote essays about objects of personal significance. Describes how they examined a piece of literature (an essay) as a model for their own writing, how they spent some time talking and listening to one another about their personal objects, and how they then wrote…

This article describes a writing activity that is employed after graded exams are handed back to students. Students are asked to reflect on their performance and to demonstrate understanding of mathematics related to the exam and/or unit of instruction. The article provides examples of student writing, scoring rubrics, and suggestions for…