College students continue to navigate powerful literacy myths that impact their writing education, especially the belief systems that uphold standard, monolingual uses of language. In this article, the authors describe "English 391ml: Multilingualism and Literacy in Western Mass," a course that raises students' critical awareness of…

Science is full of amazing facts, but at times it may be difficult to fully appreciate their significance without an understanding of the scientific practices that gave them meaning. The teaching of evolution may be an example of this situation; there are many interesting facts to consider, but it is equally important for students to learn where…

In fall 2010, the University of Massachusetts Amherst instituted a new upper-division General Education requirement, the Integrative Experience (IE), designed to help students integrate the various components of their undergraduate experience and reflect upon their learning and development as a result of those experiences, both key dimensions of…

We describe the structure of a writing-intensive, chemistry first year seminar designed to support a three week, research focused summer bridge program. Writing assignments in the seminar helped students understand their research activities, learn to conduct themselves as scientists, and reflect upon their lab work. The writing intensive seminar…

The authors describe their experience with integrating a semester-long economic analysis project into an intermediate macroeconomic theory course. Students work in teams of "economic advisors" to write a series of nested reports that analyze the current state of the economy, and propose and evaluate policies for a decision-maker. The…

The West Virginia Department of Education's auto grading initiative dates back to 2004--a time when school districts were making their first forays into automation. The Charleston based WVDE had instituted a statewide writing assessment in 1984 for students in fourth, seventh, and 10th grades and was looking to expand that program without having…

This paper describes utilizing wiki technology, small group workshops, and reflective writing assignments to "flip" a community engagement/service-learning course for college undergraduates who are tutoring culturally and linguistically diverse students in K-12 schools. Flipped classrooms are gaining popularity in the teaching of…

Promoting blog content is a social activity--a means of communicating one student's appreciation of another student's work. This article explores the feasibility of using student promotions of content, in a blogosphere, to identify quality content, and implications for students and instructors. We show that students actively and voluntarily…

Drawing on critical, socio-cultural and sociolinguistic theories of writing, text and voice, this ethnographic study examines the challenges that a mature ESL student and her instructors in a university course on Spanish Language Media face as they co-construct a common understanding of academic literacy and voice in an undergraduate General…

This document presents writing samples that have been annotated to illustrate the criteria required to meet the Common Core State Standards for particular types of writing--argument, informative/explanatory text, and narrative--in a given grade. Each of the samples exhibits at least the level of quality required to meet the Writing standards for…

Contract grading has achieved some prominence in our field as a practice associated with critical pedagogy. In this context we describe a hybrid grading contract where students earn a course grade of B based not on our evaluation of their writing quality but solely on their completion of the specified activities. The contract lists activities…

A Quest is a treasure hunt-style poem in which the writers lead the visitor to special places on the property. The poems have movement clues to take the visitor from place to place and educational clues that teach about aspects of each property. The writing experience allows students to research unique features of a local property, demonstrate…

In this Voices Inside Schools essay, a veteran teacher shares her reflections on a classroom unit entitled "How Language Reveals Character." The goal of the unit is to help adolescents read and write critically through an exploration of literary characters' language. Beginning by drawing on adolescents' fascination with one another,…

"Harvard Education Letter" is published bimonthly by the Harvard Graduate School of Education. This issue of "Harvard Education Letter" contains the following articles: (1) Confronting the Autism Epidemic: New Expectations for Children with Autism Means a New Role for Public Schools (Kate McKenna); (2) Internet Research 101:…

In this lesson, students will explore daily life in the 13 original British colonies and its influences in the late 1700s for two families in different colonies--Delaware and Massachusetts. The lesson asks students to become historical detectives and learn to gather information from artifacts and make inferences about the lives and time they…