A classroom activity to facilitate the process of forming images in the mind (seeing) while writing is described in detail. The activity, called the Where Exercise, consists of the instructor naming a series of locations and the students writing down three objects which they "see" in each of those locations. It is emphasized that the…

After presenting a series of assumptions about the teaching of playwriting (for example, that students can be taught the craft, if not the art, of playwriting; students must be kept to a strict deadline if they are to develop into disciplined writers; and playwriting should never be discussed outside the context of production possibilities), this…

Writers' comments on writing can help teachers incorporate within their classrooms the idea that writing is a process of discovery. They can remind students and teachers how important enthusiasm, motivation, and reinforcement are. Even though such comments are not saying anything new, saying the same thing in new terminology can lead to new…

Focusing on the teacher's role in helping students to be creative in writing while expressing themselves more clearly, concisely, and accurately, the first four chapters of this guide offer a simple three-step process with strategies for teachers to follow when teaching writing. First, the guide discusses how the teacher can more thoroughly…

This is an inventory of exercises enhancing dialogue and written composition to be used with comic strips in first- and second-year French courses. (Text is in French.) (TL)

This document outlines an approach to secondary school composition instruction, using wordless picture books. Specific published textless books are discussed as aids in stimulating imagination, tapping the need for sense impressions, developing sequences of events, teaching transition and the passage of time, demonstrating point of view, making…

One approach to introducing students to poetry is to have them write and analyze their own poems. Although this approach has some disadvantages, it does serve to tap students' experiences and expressive potential with creative projects and to give them an immediate and direct relationship with the traditional published works. By writing poems…

Objects assembled in nonrepresentational fashion from tinker toy pieces are the starting point for a technical description writing assignment designed to increase the students' awareness of audience while at the same time giving them practice in description, analysis, and active judgment. Having been separated into two groups, each facing a…

The latest perceptions of writer-audience relationships have not been applied to what teachers actually do in the classroom. When the idea of audience is applied at all, it is often misapplied, resulting in classroom activities that fail to facilitate learning and many, in some cases, that force students to perform tasks so unreal that credibility…

Sentence combining is one kind of practice activity, quite specific in character, aimed at teaching syntactic fluency and judgment and the use of the devices of cohesion. Students can be led through the revision process step by step by converting the odd essay from real writing to a practice exercise, then actually providing the content needed for…

Perhaps because the United States is undergoing a video revolution, perhaps because of its increasing sales of goods to non-English speaking markets where graphics can help explain the products, perhaps because of the decreasing communication skills of the work force, graphic aids are becoming more and more widely used and more and more important.…

Controlled composition--a method closely related to sentence combining--can be beneficial for college students whose writing is characterized by frequent errors and lack of fluency. Controlled composition consists of copying short, competently written compositions exactly except for certain stipulated changes. The assignments, which progress in…

The first article in this journal issue offers a diffuse definition of instructional communication, the theme of the issue, and reviews literature that points out the ill-defined parameters of communication and the classroom. The following articles discuss the development of a rhetorical perspective on teaching, the parental role in facilitating…

Integrating reading theory and instructional techniques into the composition classroom helps students improve both their reading and writing skills. Students should be evaluated early by combining diagnostic samples of their reading and writing to determine their ability to recognize organizational relationships and their facility with reading…

Exploratory problem solving that utilizes self-educating techniques such as the evaluation of feedback to improve performance can be put to use in the composition classroom. Quantitatively evaluated prewriting exercises can help students in two ways: first, students learn to use procedures that can prepare them for more sophisticated devices;…