Describes a project in a reading class in which students wrote to communicate with a real audience and in so doing interested themselves and others in reading and writing. Outlines the project's five steps of prewriting, prewriting with partners, writing, revising, and proofreading. Notes the students' overwhelming positive response to the…

A writing exchange project at Bread Loaf School of English at Middlebury College in Vermont, funded by Apple Education Foundation and McDonnell Douglas, examined what happened when high school students use word processors and a modem to write to distant audiences. In the first exchange, students interviewed each other in pairs and wrote short…

Describes several assignments and activities that focus on writing for "real-world" purposes, including writing to pen pals, government agencies, and for children or the elderly. (MM)

Suggests strategies for applying Kenneth Burke's theories of rhetoric and dialectic to technical writing instruction. Shows how teachers can use Burke's dialectic heuristic, the Pentad, to analyze writing situations they present to students. Describes how writers can use Burke's concept of "identification" as a strategy for analyzing and…

Examines relationships between writing instruction and functional composition performance of third-year secondary education Dutch students. Finds that, of 36 instructional characteristics, effective ones included instruction and exercises in writing functional texts, writing for a specific purpose, tailoring to a particular audience, global rating…

Presents results of a six-week research project in a creative writing class that focused on developing audience sensitivity among students. Describes three units combining social, rhetorical, and informational perspectives. Concludes that a sequential approach seems to increase audience sensitivity among students. (KEH)

Suggests that few references to the important issues of audience awareness exist in news writing textbooks and that technical writing literature can fill this gap. Identifies two main aspects of audience awareness, three key reasons why it should be taught to journalists, and gives audience types. Provides classroom exercises. (MS)

Epideictic rhetoric, expression of praise or blame, animates much communication, from gossip to sermons, from commercial ads to love letters. Even when writing for purposes other than to judge, writers often frame their talk with implicit or explicit expressions of praise for individuals or groups or ideas considered "good." Epideictic…

This book presents the essentials of good writing in an easy-to-follow 4-part process. The first step discussed in the book, "Using Your Noodle," guides the student through the preparatory thinking process (audience awareness, brainstorming, grouping thoughts). The second step, "Following a Format," presents the challenge of…

A study classified 61 writing assignments from 10 undergraduate science and technology courses on the basis of audience and task specifications. Most assignments emphasized reporting on specific participatory experiences, and 25 percent of assignments specified an audience other than the course instructor. Pedagogical implications for…

While recent arguments often propose that students should be engaged as writers in service to the larger community, the question remains how to engage students as intellectuals, writers, and creators of knowledge in an intellectual setting that mostly asks them to be passive learners. In Project Renaissance, leaving behind the familiar boundaries…

This book presents 113 writing "workouts" (exercises) to help students, and especially teachers, think about the small steps writers take as they learn their craft. The workouts in Part I, Writers Speak Up, are intended to help novice writers develop confidence in the value of their experience. Part II, Writers Pay Attention, presents challenges…

Developed by classroom teachers during the development phase of Minnesota's Graduation Standards, this performance package is made up of locally designed assignments that, taken together, show whether a student has learned and can apply the knowledge and skills related to writing a short story for a variety of academic and technical purposes,…

This book provides a theoretical underpinning for the strategy of freewriting through a collection of 16 essays that are very diverse in focus, methodology, and point of view. The essays are as follows: "Recording and Transforming: The Mystery of the Ten-Minute Freewrite" (Sheryl I. Fontaine); "Freewriting: An Aid to Rereading…

Plain talk is the cornerstone for creating a classroom atmosphere in which students want to learn to improve their writing. As much as possible, the jargon and technical terminology of the profession of English should be eliminated. Teachers will know what level of language to use if they determine the nature of their audience. Teachers have to…