Proposes that freshman writing instructors incorporate the form of writing practiced by the social sciences. Notes that this form constructs an intellectual bridge that leads from a limited "I"-oriented perspective to the academic discourse community. Gives three examples of writing strategies adapted from the social sciences. (RS)

Arriving college students find themselves unprepared for the demands of academic writing. Despite the sometimes condescending critical attitudes of its literary worth and the pressures of composition specialists to use nonfiction texts as instructional aids, detective fiction, like any fiction, favors the underlying characteristics students…

An alternative curriculum for Freshman Composition, designed to help students develop cognitive skills useful for academic writing in other courses, involves eight discipline-specific assignments, building from relatively simple writing tasks such as taking lecture notes and keeping an academic journal, through book reports, essay examinations,…