This collection of materials, a summary of a workshop, is in four parts. The first part lists participants in the workshop and their addresses. The second part presents a recorder's summary of statements made by six participants in a panel presentation on "What Is the Domain Beyond?" The third section gives brief accounts of three…

Two experiments were conducted to assess the influences of two individual variables--verbal aptitude and writing apprehension--on the production of persuasive arguments by college students. Subjects were 47 college students who wrote preliminary and final drafts of persuasive letters. Results of both experiments revealed that the students' verbal…

This collection of materials, a summary of a workshop, is divided into five sections, framed by introductory and concluding remarks. The sections are: (1) a panel on "What Is the Domain Beyond?"--panelists discussed their particular interests in areas that could not be traditionally classified as "cognitive" and related those…

To demonstrate how discourse tasks can differ in their cognitive difficulties, students in a graduate course on the teaching of writing participated in a procedure called "invisible writing." The purpose was to show the students that as they took on more cognitively demanding writing tasks, their ability to produce coherent discourse…

Students write a great deal during their school years, but they apparently never realize that writing affects their lives outside of school and can often even be important to their success. Research on the composing process has enabled teachers to separate the writing process from its product, but theory, practice, and research still focus on the…

Describes the problems of writer-based writers, who are unable to select and relate their knowledge effectively, and proposes exercises to develop their writing skills. (MM)

An examination of student papers from three universities on the same tasks revealed that expository writing tasks were less demanding cognitively than argumentative writing tasks and that argumentative writing tasks were less demanding than speculative tasks. Another finding was that when students were able to translate a generalized task into…

To test the hypothesis that induced mental imagery would facilitate the contemplation and reflection that have been suggested as being important to the writing process, a study investigated the effects of instructions to induce mental imagery upon the written language of young children. Subjects, 28 third grade children, were randomly assigned to…

Focusing on techniques for teaching students to integrate diverse ideas at a deep level of cognitive processing, a study evaluated an idea integration package for teaching writing in the college classroom. Subjects, 29 college students from an introductory psychology class at a Utah university, were divided into two groups. The integration group…

A study investigated the effect of Frank O'Hare's "Sentencecraft" sentence combining program on the written syntactic skills, reading comprehension level, and speed of average ability ninth-grade students. The sample consisted of 75 experimental group students and 68 control group students. Following a pretest, the experimental group…

A study focused on how the writer's knowledge of the language and use of a prewriting strategy for planning ideas affect the quality and efficiency of the writing. Three hypotheses were developed about how knowledge and strategy might influence writing performance: (1) independence (predicts that knowledge and strategy will independently improve…

Examines effects of three writing tasks on students' writing, writing processes, and later understanding of short stories. Results indicate that personal analytic and formal analytic writing were associated with significantly higher posttest scores on literature than restricted writing in the form of short answer questions. (SRT)

To determine how writing, as compared to other learning activities, affects both good and poor writers' ability to remember factual information and transfer learning, a study (1) investigated the effectiveness of a writing activity requiring students to develop compositions by synthesizing information read, and (2) explored the correspondences…

Because of her interest in determining how to persuade other teachers to incorporate process-centered writing in their classrooms, the author applied for and received a teacher-as-researcher grant. Her research was conducted in New York City and nearby suburban schools. Although city schools tended to be shabbier and some teachers were not…