This paper discusses strategies for teaching college composition, emphasizing "mechanical-meaningful-communicative" (M-M-C) sequencing. Under the M-M-C sequence, a student performs the following exercises: mechanical exercises, which build success in stimulus-response learning; meaningful exercises, which provide stimuli for problem-solving tasks;…

Sentence combining activities can be used throughout the English curriculum. The entire composing process can be developed with sentence combining activities based on student rough drafts of book reports, analysis and imitation of sentences written by professional writers, the organization of sentences in whole paragraphs or essays, and "oral…

Reflecting the view that a single formula for revolutionizing the teaching of writing is unavailable, this publication of the New York State English Council presents a series of articles dealing with various topics in the teaching of composition in high school and college settings. Subjects discussed include the following: the use of fables in the…

This paper describes a year-long, college senior composition course based on nature writing and open to students from all content areas. Nature writing is defined as writing about nature with the specific requirement that the writer must remain true to the objective facts of nature while at the same time presenting the human response to, and the…

This booklet is one of a series of teacher-written curriculum publications launched by the Bay Area Writing Project, each focusing on a different aspect of the teaching of composition. The introduction describes an analysis of predication that offers teachers insights into ways of helping students develop an expository thesis and study more…

An analysis of the poetry of Gwendolyn Brooks shows that she can be used as a model for students at many grade levels to emulate. Her poetry excels as a model, not only because of her imagery, but also because of her use and modification of both traditional and newer forms of poetry and her skill with the devices of sound. Like other evolving and…

The development and testing of a visual stimulus for writing, to be used in the initial assessment of liberal arts students at the University of Michigan, is described in this paper. The paper first discusses the questions considered by the university committee charged with establishing the assessment process regarding student writers' fluency,…

An examination was made into the problems of development of creative reasoning. Historical comments regarding the probable development of creative thought were amplified by glimpses into the lives of several mythical prehistoric characters. Contemporary classroom techniques designed to stimulate creative thought were presented for use in the areas…

To determine the effects of oral sentence-structure exercises upon student writing, a 1-year experiment was conducted with two randomly matched fourth-grade classes of approximately equal size, one control class and one experimental class. The experimental group regularly completed exercises designed to teach students to produce sentences…

The process of constructing connected discourse varies just as language structure itself varies from one language to another. Different languages combine thoughts in different ways. For the advanced level student of English as a second language, composition instruction is a critical area and should not be left to the typical freshman composition…

Day-by-day lesson ideas are given for an eight-day writing unit in which students study literary conventions and write their own short stories. Evaluation of the stories is continuous throughout the unit and partly done by other students. (SJL)

Early childhood classes traditionally have used a "multi-" approach to education that is based on young children's growth and development. Offers a variety of multisensory and multimedia activities in many curriculum areas that can be useful in the busy end-of-school weeks. (Author/RK)

Describes how a teacher paired a low-ability, difficult migrant child with a high-ability child for classroom writing activities and how the low-ability child's writing improved measurably as a result. (SRT)

Noting that students in groups learn more effectively when working cooperatively than when working competitively or individualistically, presents guidelines, assignments, and class activities designed to foster cooperative learning. Describes such student-student interaction sessions as describing sense perception details, receiving peer feedback,…

Presents the idea that many tactics sports coaches use in training and improving athletes' performance can be adapted for the instruction of remedial writers. (JC)