Two-course writing sequences are valuable because they extend the time that students spend focused on developing as writers and researchers, yet they cannot rely on a "more is better" argument to justify their ongoing implementation, especially when general education curricula are shrinking and one course often looks much the same as the…

Presents several assumptions about scientific writing and from these derives teaching methods for a year-long sequence of writing courses for science freshmen. (DD)

The purpose of this guide is to provide educators with a unified, consistent approach to the teaching of expository writing skills. The guide emphasizes the sequential development of writing skills from kindergarten through grade 12 and provides objectives for each grade level. Each objective is accompanied by an explanation that further defines…

Describes a system for arranging assignments in a composition course that aims to prepare students for academic writing, by focusing entirely on exposition and its conceptual demands. (HTH)

Provides eight sequential, process-oriented writing assignments: (1) diagnostic essay, (2) personal account, (3) ghost writing, (4) summary, (5) developing a thesis, (6) exploratory essay, (7) proposal, and (8) final paper. (HTH)

A writing course structured on the principle that personal experience essays should be written as arguments that draw out a conflict or opposing view can help student writers avoid producing prose that is either too abstract or too concrete. Students can be taught to approach the personal essay as a special type of argument on a particular…

The effectiveness of the Kates method of teaching composition, which involves regular, sequential writing assignments and teacher/student conferences, was investigated using an experimental group of 142 ninth-grade students in six classes and a control group of 78 students in two classes. The experimental classes wrote approximately 14 essays in…

Noting that combining reading instruction with writing instruction is more effective than teaching writing alone, describes and evaluates various sequential activities and exercises to promote involved reading. Includes mapping, summarizing, synthesizing, and critiquing assigned readings, all of which lead to the research paper. (JG)

Intended for high school composition instructors, this book resolves the seeming contradiction between creative, expressive writing and formal exposition and argumentation by presenting a teaching method that treats creative writing as a necessary--if not sufficient--cause for exposition. The first two chapters describe a sequence of short fiction…

Composed by English teachers at the elementary, secondary, and college levels, this book describes practical methods for teaching writing. Part one contains essays on issues related to teaching writing, such as motivation, evaluation, and teaching sequence. Part two describes more than 100 practical lessons for classroom use, each of which…

Writing can be taught most effectively when teachers build the disorienting characteristics of reading literature into the inventive stages (prewriting and revision) of writing literary interpretations. The reading of literature and the process of composing interpretive essays are both different and similar. They are similar because they are both…

Following an organizational outline of specific language skills associated with expository writing (but applicable to creative writing as well), this booklet charts the introductory, teaching/refinement, and mastery levels from kindergarten through grade 12 for writing skills in the categories of sentence structure, paragraph structure,…

A sequential series of writing assignments designed and tested for a tenth grade writing workshop through the cooperative efforts of college and technical high school English teachers is discussed in this paper. Twelve assignments and their underlying educational theories are explained. The first six assignments are described as progressive and…

A sequential writing program is described that has adapted James Moffett's ideas in "Teaching the Universe of Discourse" to suit the needs of a seventh and eighth grade school system that emphasizes expository writing instruction. The introductory chapter explains Moffett's ideas and how they were adapted for this program. Subsequent…

Since engineering graduates and other technical students are frequently expected to document their projects as well as present such material orally, a Speech and Technical Writing course was designed at a New Hampshire college to prepare students for both technical writing tasks and oral presentations of their material. The course provides an…