The use of writing models with nonnative English speakers has received a certain amount of criticism--especially from teachers whose students copy models in their entirety or follow them too closely. The misuse of models has brought some teachers to the point where they believe that the best kind of pedagogy is to abandon writing models…

The purpose of this qualitative action research study was to explore how critical pedagogy can foster writing competency and critical consciousness among adult basic writing students in a community college writing classroom. To this end, critical pedagogy and related critical discourses were used to theoretically frame this study. These theories…

This article suggests one way of categorizing types of factual writing and introduces a teaching strategy for developing students' awareness of structural and language features of many factual genres. It is based on genre theory and the idea that generic structures of texts are determined by the purpose of the text. Six nonfiction genres are…

Discusses four interrelated aspects of identity related to the teaching of writing, including the effects of people's life histories on their writing, the affect of discourse type on identity, the impression that individuals give of themselves in their writing, and writers' expression of authorship, authoritativeness, and authorial presence.…

Offers three responses to a question about discourse synthesis and how it can be applied in the elementary classroom. (MG)

Suggests that technical writers should emphasize similarities rather than differences between oral and written discourse. Argues that implicit rules of conversation have much to offer the technical writer. Illustrates how the principles of conversation can be applied to the process of writing instructions. (KEH)

Examines the opposition of objectified exposition and personal narrative posited by rhetorical tradition and maintained by most composition texts and syllabi today. Argues that the best thinking and writing are simultaneously personal and public, infused with private meaning and focused upon the world beyond the self.(MG)

Ken Macrorie coined the term "I Search," which puts the writer at the center of the paper and seeks to put a human face on the data collected. Looking for a way to use the research writing assignment to help students learn to adjust their ideas to different formats by becoming more aware of how different structures can be shaped around…

Describes a writing assignment designed to help students incorporate into a single essay Moffett's writer-subject progressions: dramatization, narration, exposition, and logical argumentation. Describes one student's progress through successive drafts to arrive at this goal, and how discussions of her draft helped the other students. (HTH)

The concept of genre should not be limited to literary genres, but should be expanded to include all types of texts, including those traditionally considered to be nonliterary. Essentially, many things about writing work the way they do because of genre, and a better understanding of genre can give us a better understanding of writing, reading and…

A case study examined purpose in the writing of four college freshmen enrolled in a basic composition course. Discourse based interviews were conducted with the subjects before and after they responded to each of three writing tasks designed to provide them with different choices for audience, mode, and focus. The data revealed two central ways in…

At Southerland Institute (a pseudonym), in spite of the teacher's strong statements in favor of encouraging students to think for themselves and to work together, the writing program Southerland's teachers outline is formulaic with its required modes, prescribed five-paragraph-like essay form, and bell-curve grading practices. A new rhetorician…

Rhetoric textbooks continue to proliferate while writing teachers continue to grow more skeptical of their usefulness. The key question educators need to answer is whether all available composition textbooks are ineffective in the sense of being based on false notions about the composing process, or whether they are "intrinsically" ineffective.…

Discusses the results of a study in which 130 college composition textbooks were examined in order to determine the role that expressive discourse plays in the teaching of writing at the college level. (DF)

The metaphor of community has become central to discussions about reading, writing, and teaching. According to this metaphor, an individual learns a discourse through entering into the community that uses it, and by accepting the practices and values of those already in it. Yet an argument can be raised for a definition of discourse that is not…