To combat the inevitable intellectual fatigue that autobiographical essay assignments often engender and, more importantly, to provide students with an authentic audience and purpose for their writing, the author designed an autobiographical assignment that liberates students from the traditional essay format while empowering them to envision…

This article argues that the goal of an educator is to help students realize they can be effective writers by giving them the ability to demonstrate their skills. Scene writing can make writing seem less like a chore and more like an opportunity to express ideas. As students write scenes that include both dialogue and action, they gain a deeper…

Whether novice or experienced, writers must come to terms with the daunting task of filling up a blank page, or screen, in an effort to produce writing. Student writers are no different. They enter teachers' classes having confronted similar difficulties with discovering what it is they want to say. In seeking to help students, they devote…

Sharon Creech's book, "Love That Dog," is the story of a young poet named Jack, a good teacher, and a dog. Using free verse, Jack describes how he becomes a writer in dated journal entries. He is just an average kid, like so many of the kids in one's classes. But Jack has an excellent English teacher in Miss Stretchberry. She assigns freewriting…

About 10 years ago, Robert J. Connors's article "The Erasure of the Sentence" questioned the disappearance of writing style and examined the validity of some of the reasons given for its disappearance. Since that 2000 article, the study of style has undergone a kind of renaissance, with numerous books and articles on its uses in composition theory…

The more the author delved into forming her poetry unit, the more poetry opened up to her. She began to appreciate it for its creative ability to help readers and writers understand texts, experiences, and ideas. It was the length of time involved that concerned her most. She was mainly trying to work out the pace needed to cover as much as…

Describes writing as a dynamic process involving both creativity and discipline, and suggests classroom strategies useful in teaching this process. (DD)

Description of the techniques used to create relaxed environment in a high school acting class. (SP)

A successful method of teaching poetry to high school students, using audiovisual materials, is described. (SP)

Outlines educational arguments about attitudes, methods, and accountability. Surveys some teachers to find out how they craft a blending of pedagogical perspectives. Concludes that educators can maintain creativity in the face of demands for standardization of curriculum. (PM)

Students and teachers participated in an Arts Week program that was educationally sound and promoted communication among faculty members. (JH)

Music can be used to provide an environment for creativity, as a topic of study, or as a medium for student expression. (JH)

A discussion on product versus process'' writing instruction by a process person, concluding that a proper focus on process will lead to a proper focus on product. (RB)

Letting students create poems out of random collections of words involves and interests them.

All students enrolled in media courses gained in creativity. (JH)