The purpose of this study is to investigate how the US-based First-Year Composition (FYC) instructors understand and facilitate metacognition in their classes and assess students' metacognition through exploratory, mixed methods approaches. I argue that even if we understand the importance of metacognition generally for student populations, we…

This paper explores the reasoning processes expert teachers use when reading and responding to elementary students' writing. We report findings from a qualitative multi-case study drawing on "think-aloud" interview data from seventeen participants as they read and responded to narrative, informational, and opinion/argumentative drafts.…

The purpose of this retrospective case study was to examine the implementation of peer-review practices in a doctoral dissertation proposal course. Twenty-eight doctoral candidates' perceptions of peer feedback on the dissertation writing process and themselves as academic writers were explored through our anecdotal notes from class discussions,…

Second language writing researchers have examined the affordances of Automated Writing Evaluation programs in providing immediate feedback that helps improve students' writing outputs. However, a little is known about tracking learners' process during writing essays and whether much/less pauses made by learners could predict good/poor quality of…

Within the burgeoning literature on online formative assessment mediated by particular ICT tools in writing courses, the scrutiny focusing on the enactment of assessment for learning (AfL) in the similar context has been inadequately addressed. This current study, therefore, is in an attempt to fill this empirical void by exploring how EFL…

Narrative has begun to take its place alongside the essay, for so long the stereotypical currency of the history teacher and student. In this work, based on his experiences as a PGCE student, Alex Rodker argues powerfully that it is time now to consider how to help students to produce not just narratives, but better narratives. He builds on the…

In this article, we discuss what it means to learn troublesome "threshold concepts" about writing that cannot be adequately grappled with in a single course or assignment. Here, two faculty members and a graduate of a writing major reflect on elements of the writing curriculum, the writing center practicum, and the learning dispositions…

At the same time that creativity, play, and inquiry are receiving special focus in academic, professional, and educational settings, mandated assessments have never been more prominent, despite public debates that question the value of such testing. In the context of these apparently contradictory developments in literacy education, as a…

We present a new approach to investigating student reasoning while writing: real-time capture of the dynamics of the writing process. Key-capture or video software is used to record the entire writing episode, including all pauses, deletions, insertions, and revisions. A succinct shorthand, "S notation," is used to highlight significant…

The one-on-one format of tutoring, which is the norm for "writing" centers, can foster the much-maligned view of a "writing center" as a fix-it shop and undermine the role of the tutor as a co-learner and facilitator of peer-to-peer interactions. The peer-interactive "writing center approach", presented here, moves…

This article makes a case for the inclusion of creative writing in Library & Information Science (LIS) courses. Using an example of the course on reading practices and audiences, it shows how creative writing can contribute to the development of creativity, critical thinking, ability for self-direction and independent learning--all the…

In this paper we report a case study of two first-year students at a university in Hong Kong doing the same writing assignment that required the use of sources. We explore the students' understanding of plagiarism, their strategies for composing, the similarity between their texts and source texts, and the lecturer's assessment of their work. The…

Examines the writings of an engineer employed by a large manufacturing firm. Argues that the engineer's writing, although not the final product, is the essential means by which the product is created. Suggests that, because a report reflects final, agreed-upon knowledge about a product, the product and the document become one in the engineer's…

A study examined the writing experiences of three college students during their freshman and sophomore years to determine how students in a classroom setting determine the writing requirements of that discipline and for that teacher, and how they go about producing their writing assignments. The study used ethnographic observation and interviews,…

Outlines a text-based, interactionist approach toward writing and written communication. A brief analysis of the working drafts and revisions of a first-year college student's essay is offered to illustrate how key textual features function reflexively to establish and sustain the evolving but mutually held rational grounds of school writing and…