Classroom community is an integral part of facilitating a safe and supportive learning environment for students. Teachers, architects of community, recognize the importance of encouraging collaboration and respect among students in the classrooms and schools, and the value of nurturing atmospheres of respect. Teachers who are intentional about…

The authors present a new young adult novel as a focal point for preparing prospective secondary teachers to employ a rich variety of literacies to enhance literature instruction. The hope is to encourage literature teachers to consider a wide range of useful methodologies available across generations of educational research. By demonstrating how…

Teachers live to inspire and be inspired. Sadly, most high school teachers work alone in the confines of their teaching assignments and tight, chaotic schedules, while many college professors teach and conduct research within the confines of their institutions, seldom reaching out to fellow instructors at different institutions that serve…

Time and opportunity to discover truths are essential in education. Discovery takes repetition and trial and error. Discovery crosses intellectual and disciplinary boundaries as well. What is learned through the diverse experiences of one's academic and individual lives will pollinate each other if there is room left for discovery. The tyranny of…

Provides a number of classroom activities, including skits, which foster creative thinking and bring vigor to the classroom setting. Relates how, in one class, students were given the opportunity to collaborate on skits in lieu of the final exam. (HB)

Argues that teachers of writing can readily become forces for peace in our schools and, by extension, in society at large. Argues that returning to personal story at the center of the writing curriculum, accompanied by deep listening, will promote peace and well-being, voice and sense of self, and respect and caring as well as powerful literacy in…

Describes the author's efforts in establishing writing groups in a middle school classroom. Discusses setting standards, teacher role, and common projects. Concludes that the development of a safe writing environment requires open discussion about the needs and ears of writers and a common objective or project for revision and response. (SR)

Criticizes theoretical schema of learning/writing processes (e.g., steps such as problem identifying, investigating, getting insights, expressing, refining, announcing, and reacting) to the actual experience of process which never fits such classifications. Cites theories of J. Dewey and F. M. Alexander to distinguish between attention to means…

Describes a literature instruction method in which at any one time about half of the students read independently whereas the other half participate in one of two study groups. Discusses how the initial plan was modified. (RS)

Discusses aspects of the classroom environment that nurture young writers. Describes strategies and assignments (including cross-curricular poetry, a letter writing activity, multigenre papers, a tribute assignment, and a "read and retail" assignment) which helps students understand and develop voice. Notes that while students' writing…

A study of writing by high school seniors and first-year college students found that classroom conditions were a large factor in student improvement. Larger class sizes in high school and less time devoted strictly to writing were the chief detriments to improvement in the seniors' writing.

Reports the highlights of the first year of the National Study of Secondary School Writing, which provides new information about secondary school writing instruction. (RL)

Discusses how 4 teachers handle writing assignments, response, grading, portfolios, time allotted for completion of assignments, and classroom environment for English-as-a-second-language students. (RS)

Describes how a high school English teacher set up a project to help students who made frequent conventional errors become more aware of them, choose goals based on their own writing weaknesses, collect data, work toward improvement, and assess their success. Argues that, while not all students are reached, the climate of the classroom is…

Shares the experiences of one teacher who changed her way of teaching high school at-risk students by creating an environment that encouraged students to explore writing and reading topics of their choice. Finds that students changed and learned using the writing-reading workshop approach. (MG)