This paper challenges the widely held assumption that teaching writing inevitably equips students with the critical thinking skills required to succeed in college and beyond. The paper reviews the literature on the relationship between writing and the development of critical thinking skills, and critically reflects on the author's experiences in…

This article gives an account of creating and delivering a (trans)disciplinary writing-intensive course focused on translation and translingual writing. The course, offered in a comparative literature program at a Canadian university, was co-created by an applied linguist, a literature professor, and a curriculum theorist, and was inspired in part…

Multimodality is recognized as a useful pedagogical tool, but it is often difficult to apply in real-life curricula. Further, expectations on educators and various campus units are increasingly complex and require nimble and innovative partnerships. In this article, Christina, a first-year composition instructor, and Lucie, the university's…

This paper describes a pilot blended learning format for a first-year genre-based Canadian composition course. It measures responses to the online learning materials and hybrid class schedule by comparing student writing skill perception questionnaires, teaching evaluation questionnaires, and written assignments for control and experimental…

Service-learning is an experiential pedagogy which integrates curriculum and volunteer service through ongoing reflection. Research suggests that service-learning offers notable benefits for post-secondary English-as-an-additional-language (EAL) students. However, most of the researchers have studied EAL students within the United States; far…

This article describes a model for supporting undergraduate research that can be adapted for very different classroom contexts; we implemented this model in a first-year general education composition class, a second-year Psychology class and a fourth-year English literature seminar. We examine student work created for each class as well as…

A growing literature suggests that there is a disjuncture between the instructional practices of the education system and the student body it is expected to serve, particularly with respect to the roles of digital technologies. Based on surveys and focus group interviews of first-year students at a primarily undergraduate Canadian university and…

The objective of this project is to establish a statement of core aims for first-year Communications writing courses that will serve to: (1) Facilitate the process of establishing equivalence of existing and future Communications courses for transfer purposes; (2) Address evolving challenges to the existing transfer and articulation process,…

Increasing numbers of ESL (English as a Second Language) students are entering college and university programs, and educators in these programs are concerned about student preparedness. ESL students enter the post-secondary system from a variety of places, resulting in a lack of uniformity in entry level academic skills. A significant associated…

Letters over a period of 25 years from a Canadian who came to the United States after college graduation to teach in various parts of the country, then returned to teach in Canada, reflect substantial differences between the 2 educational systems in regard to the teaching and testing of writing. (MSE)

Examines the roots of the modern language arts curriculum in Canada. Claims it is based on nineteenth-century interdependence of studies in rhetoric, history of the English language, and literature. And asserts that this curriculum was designed to develop rhetorical and critical sophistication. (JK)