The impetus behind the design and implementation of the Common Core State Standards (CCSS) was to establish nationwide criteria in preparing students to be college or career ready by the end of high school. The standards require students to comprehend, analyze, and evaluate text across a wide range of disciplines. Essential to the mastery of the…

This article uses corpus methods to examine linguistic expressions of stance in over 4,000 argumentative essays written by incoming first-year university students in comparison with the writing of upper-level undergraduate students and published academics. The findings reveal linguistic stance markers shared across the first-year essays despite…

To effectively teach university lecturers or students to write a good research article (RA) abstract for publication in international journals, instructors need to know the present characteristics of abstracts written published in such journals. This study examines the discourse structure and linguistic features of RA abstracts written in English…

Studies of "transfronterizos" have highlighted the potential ways in which these students might draw on their linguistic, cultural, or knowledge capital on both sides of the border. However, because "transfronterizos" may cross borders to participate in institutional contexts, such as schooling, they can find themselves in the…

This study examines the impact of "Disaggregate Instruction" on students' science learning. "Disaggregate Instruction" is the idea that science teaching and learning can be separated into conceptual and discursive components. Using randomly assigned experimental and control groups, 49 fifth-grade students received web-based…

This paper describes some aspects of essays produced by students who as writers in the United States would commonly be called "basic writers." The paper focuses primarily on the grammatical subjects in these essays and offers a view of how closely grammatical structure typical in speech correspond to those typical in writing. It reports…

Discusses and problematizes the notion of education as a transformative experience for students and teachers. Recounts the literacy history of the author. Discusses the ongoing tension in American culture between difference and unity, and how this tension has influenced composition theory and practice. (HB)

Suggests that it is appropriate to view the community college as a discourse community in its own right, and as a part of the larger discourse community of higher education. Argues that this shift in judgment might increase perceptions of community college competence, thus moving them into positions of legitimate power. (Contains 14 references.)…

Over the years, substantial shifts in theory, belief, and practice have occurred in the teaching of language, specifically vocabulary, grammar, or their combination in lexicogrammatical features of a language as part of the writing class or curriculum (Paltridge, 2004; Reid, 1993, 2006). Much of the instruction in L2 writing for adult learners who…

Factors such as increases in student numbers and technological developments are threatening the luxury of one-on-one tutorials and bringing changes in modes of academic discourse. This small scale exploratory study identifies characteristics of taped oral, compared to written, feedback that are attributable to its spoken nature (longer, less…

An advanced writing course required of English education majors may also be taken by students in the humanities. The course helps students gain experience with longer and more complex essays, develop a more mature writing style, and learn how to make metacognitive evaluations of their own and others' writing. It also extends the contexts and…

A study examined: (1) first-year college students and their perceptions of writing; (2) teaching assistants and their discursive preferences; and (3) possible limitations in the program's approach toward portfolio assessment. The study began with the examination of narration, persuasion, and analysis papers from six freshman portfolios. These…

This study looks at language teachers' and language researchers' expectations and evaluations of two kinds of journal articles, either researcher-oriented or teacher-oriented. The results show that teachers and academics use different ways of validating information in journal articles and use the information contained in them in distinctly…

Interactive discourse structuring is used to guide listeners through on-going speech and has been shown to have a positive effect on lecture comprehension, particularly in L2 settings. As mobility increases in the academic world, there are more opportunities for lecture events characterized not only by linguistic/cultural diversity, but also by…