Presents writing as a form of dialog and the paragraph as a unit of implied dialog. (MM)

Ten college students deemed to have above average writing ability and ten basic skills students participated in a study that examined the role of reading in the writing process. The students wrote one personal essay in a timed and videotaped session. During half of this session, the students wrote and planned as they normally would in an impromptu…

Contends that the Given-New research done by linguists on texts can be used effectively in process approaches to teaching composition. Finds that Given-New principles of text analysis are useful in teaching individual students, but that there is more to creating coherence than simply overlapping subjects and objects. (MS)

In order to evaluate writer control of global coherence under various contexts, writer texts produced by 13 college freshmen enrolled in a basic skills section of a composition course were collected as a natural part of the ongoing instruction. The texts examined were written on five different topics: misuse of power, a personal experience of the…

Examined the relationship between cohesion and coherence in children's writing and investigated the degree to which this relationship would vary with quality of writing and grade level. Concludes that the relationship between cohesion and coherence did not vary according to quality of writing or grade level. (SRT)

Evaluates process theory, suggests its limits, and addresses some of the conceptual problems it leaves unresolved. (RBW)

One of the goals of writing instruction is to teach students to develop coherence in their writing; however, writing instruction that relies too heavily on logical connections and organizational techniques often introduces so many rules that students lose their personal connection to what they write. Coherence has less to do with structure than…

To determine if using visual patterns can help technically oriented people create coherent papers, 97 students enrolled in a beginning composition class were given five hours of instruction in the use of the "hub and spokes" (central idea supported by examples), "S-curve" (pro-con), and pyramid (inductive or deductive) formats. Holistic…

This longitudinal study examined the development of the semantic "strand" (the relationship between drawing and writing, differentiation of literary genres, influence of literature, coherence, and part-whole coordination) of children's writing development over a 5-year period. Subjects, eight girls and nine boys enrolled in a small,…

A study examined the effect of topic-specific background knowledge on the general quality and local coherence of student writing. Ninety-seven tenth grade students were assigned two writing tasks on specific topics at two points during a semester. J. Langer's measure of topic-specific knowledge was administered prior to each writing task. Each…

An experiment was designed to test an instrument that could assist writers and editors in selecting strategies for improving the comprehensibility of written instructions. In addition, the study examined how successful professional writers are in improving passages selected for difficulty. The subjects, 150 experienced writers, were given an…

Examines the relationship between cohesion and coherence in children's writing. Finds evidence of a relationship between cohesion and coherence, and reports that this relationship (1) varies according to text content; (2) does not vary according to quality of writing; and (3) does not vary according to the students' grade level. (KEH)

Arguing that discourse coherence can provide a window on the writing processes that produce it, this paper describes developmental differences observed in children's writing and proposes a procedural model to account for those differences. The first section of the paper points out that a developmental model of the writing process should specify…

By investigating the similarities and differences between speech and writing, teachers can help students mature as writers. The difference between speech and writing in conveying meaning is explained by the degree of context dependence of the utterance or passage. Speech is highly context-dependent because a speaker depends on a listener to assist…

Acknowledging that ordering, spatial orientation, and synthesis are important properties in achieving clarity in writing, a study investigated the biological influences on students' writing processes and ways to help writers produce more coherent written products. Subjects, two males and four females ranging in age from 19 to 40, were tested using…