In developing teaching strategies for students who are poor writers but good readers, it is useful to explore the characteristics of good readers and of poor writers, and to consider implications for improving classroom practices. Good readers tend to put into practice four major cognitive strategies when they read: they plan, translate or…

Generating writing ideas is often a serious obstacle for students. Some classroom techniques to help them out of this dilemma include word associating and self-questioning. Students can also construct a matrix chart with the subheadings from their information resources. Once ideas are generated, they can be arranged in appropriate presentation…

The design of a program for teaching audience awareness proceeds in a clear and logical order so that it can be incorporated into any writing syllabus concerned with traditional matters of form. The program begins with a brief questionnaire designed to elicit student problems with and feelings about audience. Class discussion of the questionnaire…

This paper addresses the issue of learning to write and the need for defining a means of teaching the process of composing. Following a description of what kind of process writing is not, the composing process is presented as a continuum of making meaning out of a chaos of images, half-truths, remembrances, and syntactic fragments. The discovery…

Describes a teaching technique which involves the writing teacher's using the blackboard in composing a short essay in front of the class. (DD)

Quickwriting, a method for teaching writing to second language learners, features concentrating on content; not worrying about form; and writing without stopping. The process has the key advantage of aiding invention by separating the creating process from the editing process. Other advantages and some disadvantages of this method are discussed.…

Argues for a rethinking of the act of writing as the creation of a work of art. Discusses the implications of how a change in view can affect the practice of teaching writing. (JC)

Argues that if textbooks of writing give the best theories available to teachers and teachers of writing, particularly those who see this role as subordinate to that of scholar and teacher within their area of study, the teachers must first be convinced to become philosophers of composition. (RAE)

Argues that with the merging of old and new pedagogies in teaching writing, composition course methodology is becoming confusing. Asserts that unless composition courses become places to learn through writing, students are being shortchanged. (RAE)

Asserts that the "Advice to Writers" project, encouraging students to articulate what they do when they write and to share those perceptions with fellow student writers, is an effective way for students to reflect on the writing process. (MM)

Describes a six-phase writing assignment for ESL students to help them grasp the concept of an audience beyond the writing instructor. (HTH)

Argues that teaching arrangement inductively offers an alternative to the standard imitation of business communication text models. Asserts that the inductive method stimulates individual rather than formulaic responses to the problems of organization, and that inductively-trained writers see arrangements as a powerful element in persuasive…

Argues that the romantic and classical theories about writing are not necessarily contradictory and proposes a larger view of the writing process that would accommodate both theories. Notes that problems in choosing composition instruction approaches stem from teachers' failure to distinguish between two of three categories of nonfiction writing.…

Discusses the philosophical thought of Jacques Derrida and Michel Foucault as it applies to writing instruction. (SRT)

This study examined effects of editing and cooperation on an instruction writing task performance on an individual transfer task. Results showed: (1) dyads significantly outperformed individuals on communication score; (2) noneditors outperformed editors; (3) completeness score with editors outperformed individuals on the first task; and (4) no…