This discussion introduces a heuristic to guide writing instruction with adolescents and young adults. Our framework, called "Open World Writing," consists of six writing territories (vision, material, design, voice, flow, polish) that provide focus and clarity for writing and educators working across academic and creative writing…

Adolescents today need mental health support (U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, 2024), and schools are a place where a universal approach to positive well-being can be promoted (Weissberg, 2019). While programs exist for social and emotional learning (SEL), there is a call for teachers to find a way for daily SEL integration into the…

Background: There is currently a dearth of research on the neural framework of writing tasks in children, as measured by neuroimaging techniques. Objective: This paper provides an overview of the current literature examining the neurological underpinnings of written expression in children. Design: Using a scoping review approach, with thorough…

This case study of teacher research explores the utility of framing the writing development of adolescent writers in terms of their discursive identities and strategic behaviors. By merging our understandings of these frameworks, I argue that we can examine how adolescents' goals, values, and beliefs associated with writing inform the strategic…

Although school is only one of many places where youths write, the writing privileged in school is often upheld as standard, whereas adolescents' out-of-school writing often uses forms, styles, and topics not taught or allowed in school. Little is known about how K-12 educators can use research on out-of-school writing to inform in-school writing…

The Institute for Education Sciences identifies main idea and summarization instruction as effective practices for improving adolescent students' reading comprehension. Main idea generation is a higher-level comprehension skill that requires students to read the text, connect information across the paragraph or section, determine the most…

Critical thinking is one of the most highly sought skills in education, yet questions remain about instilling students with this elusive set of skills and dispositions. Is it generalizable or discipline-specific? How should it be taught? This article describes an approach by two middle school teachers who developed and taught an in-person and…

In this article, we draw on the work of Michel Foucault to analyze one student's subject development in an expository writing classroom. James, the participant, was embarking on the project of becoming a good student, as he understood it, after struggling and leaving school previously. Drawing on interviews, classroom observations and written…

The aim of this article is to reveal the ways in which six 14- to 15-year-old second language (L2) learners, two each of high, mid, and low English proficiency levels were cognitively engaged in writing while using an automated content feedback program known as the Essay Critiquing System 2.0 in three out of five workshops in a Hong Kong secondary…

Research about adolescents sharing creative writing in interest-driven online communities has suggested that teachers can play important roles in helping young writers realize the potential of online spaces. Framed by sociocultural notions of new literacies and a conceptual framework theorizing the rhetorical situation when sharing writing in…

Views about what writing is and how it should be taught have varied over the years as well as across contexts. Studies of curricula, teaching materials, and teaching practices have shown a strong focus on skills, genres, and processes, but few have asked teachers about their perspectives on writing. In this article we explore what views, or…

Exemplary adolescent creative writers' stories and poems demonstrate a connection between personal purposes for writing and the development of advanced technical skills. This hermeneutic analysis of 33 student texts (which were chosen because of their relation to the topic of literacy) reveals three main reasons for writing (remembrance,…

The present study investigates the use of authentic texts (fiction and non-fiction) in 180 video-recorded language arts lessons across 46 secondary classrooms in Norway. It assesses how the texts are used and what kind of language arts-related activities and discourses students are engaging in. The study finds that a majority of the lessons do not…

The What Works Clearinghouse (WWC) Practice Guide, "Teaching Secondary Students to Write Effectively," offers educators three specific, evidence-based recommendations that address the challenges of teaching students in grades 6-12 to write effectively. This summary focuses on the first of the three recommendations: Explicitly teach…

In this article, the authors report on what began as a series of rather desperate English teacher acts: The authors implemented a youth participatory action research photovoice research project with adolescents in a range of diverse communities that were united by young adults' detachment from their writing processes and products and from their…