States that the beliefs and practices associated with holistic, child-centered teaching and literature-based reading instruction are being challenged at every turn. Finds that publishers have developed basals that purport to be all things to all people. Gives the history of basal reader development. Suggests that basal systems are being used as…

Although many composition teachers have taken to heart recent studies on the mind-brain (humanities/science) link and have begun to anticipate enhancing the teaching profession by providing a solid link between teachers of writing and "hard" scientists, such links between minds and brains should not become part of pedagogical design. Textbooks and…

This book explains and exemplifies formative assessment in practice. Drawing on incidents and case studies from primary classrooms, it describes and analyses how teachers use formative assessment to promote learning. It argues the case for formative assessment with reference to sociocultural perspectives on learning and it examines this in the…

To assist textbook adoption committees in answering the questions that arise as they consider basal reading series, this paper provides a discussion of readability. Following a brief introduction, the second section of the paper offers a background discussion of what readability really means. In addition, this section looks at three factors to…

By building up the confidence of student writers, writing teachers hope to reduce the hostility and anxiety so often found in authoritarian introductory college composition classes. Process oriented writing theory implicitly defines confidence as a wholly personal quality resulting from students' discovery that they do have "something to…