Faculty members take pride in the great diversity of students attending LaGuardia Community College. Their students self-identify with various nationalities, races, religions, ethnicities, and sexual orientations. Not only do students adopt diverse identity markers, but they also come to their classroom with variant skill levels. It is difficult…

Describes one method of responding to the sales techniques of college textbook publishers' representatives. (AEA)

Argues for a more principled and careful consideration of composition handbooks. Discusses the values and measures used to evaluate handbooks, what constitutes the act of writing, what constitutes good writing, and who writes and why. Lists questions to serve as a guide for instructors in handbook selection. (TB)

Determines whether the textbook "Elements of Writing" is an improvement over "Warriner's" which it replaces. Considers how in determining whether a textbook promotes the curriculum and daily activities that lead to a rich perspective of writing, teachers need to consider what it means for a textbook to focus on writing and what teachers mean by…

Poses the theory that teaching is telling a story about the acquisition of knowledge. Explores the approaches of four composition textbooks using the pattern of heroic adventure (separation, initiation, and return) as a basis for comparison. Concludes that the implied educational values in texts should be considered conscientiously by teachers.…

Offers advice to sufferers of "textbookitis:" (1) writing textbooks are not necessary for high school classes; (2) the best language textbook is a dictionary--money not spent on a writing textbook could be spent on sets of dictionaries; and (3) literature anthologies can be useful additions to the writing classroom. (RL)

A review of research on writing textbooks suggests that in general, they do not reflect current theories in either content or instructional approach. Examination of some second language writing textbooks reveals three types: (1) those with a traditional approach emphasizing grammar, form, and models; (2) books acknowledging but not integrating new…

Reports, from personal textbook publishing experience, that composition teachers do not want the results of research in their textbooks; they want what's familiar to them. (JL)

Presents criteria to help teachers choose textbooks for English-as-a-Second-Language (ESL) composition students, based on how well each text teaches users to write argumentative essays (a form foreign to many ESL students). Evaluates 14 textbooks using these criteria. (SR)

Advice on selecting a reference book for the writing class and particular writing students. A classification of recommended, good, fair, and not recommended handbooks. (RL)

Offers suggestions, in the form of a rating questionnaire, that members of textbook selection committees can use to assure that textbooks are analyzed systematically and compared fairly. (RL)

Technical writing instructors lack a framework for evaluating pedagogical materials. One framework for classification divides the pedagogical materials into three groups: those locating their heuristics in form, context, and method. Formal pedagogies (the modes, sentence generation) can produce generic writing, separated from audience, purpose,…

Explores the assumptions underlying the use of composition textbooks based on nineteenth-century forms and modes of discourse: description, narration, exposition, and argumentation. Presents alternatives to this approach, developed from schema theory and developmental psychology. (HTH)

The 10 papers collected in this book deal with reading and writing instruction, the relationship between teachers and researchers, the role of the school administration in promoting literacy, the dangers of inappropriate standards, using poetry to improve literacy, and textbook adoptions. Papers include: (1) "Knowing What to Do--And Doing…

This bibliography is divided into three sections. Section I, Review of General Educational Development (GED) Publisher Composition Texts, reviews extensively the texts published by Cambridge, Contemporary, Scott Foresman, and Steck-Vaughn to enable the instructor to choose a primary text. The reviews tell the exact instructional sequence of the…