Examines a subset of collaborative dialogues that occurred in a a multistage task where Canadian Grade 7 French immersion students worked together in pairs. Each pair wrote a story, noticed differences between their text and a reformulator's revision, and reflected on their noticing. Traces development of the target language (French), with…

Analyzes the extensive use of personal examples and stories in the academic essays of students who are nonnative speakers of English. Draws on a large database of college examination essays to compare the use of personal examples in essays written by native and nonnative speakers. Finds nonnative students not only use examples more often than…

Shares how posing realistic problems with students provides them with an opportunity to value their own opinion and develop effective arguments on their position. (MG)

Investigates the impact of task definition on students' revising strategies. Finds that texts written by students who receive instruction on global revision are judged both to be of significantly better quality and include significantly more global revisions than students who were simply asked to make the text better. (MG)

Examines the enthusiastic discourse that has accompanied the introduction of computers into writing classes. Explores how this language may influence both change and the status quo in electronic classrooms. Argues that writing instructors, by thinking critically and carefully about technology, can succeed in using it to improve the educational…

Briefly described is an instructional activity, the "Short Story Booklet," designed to aid exceptional students in grades 7-12 to put their thoughts on paper. The students write stories using processes of prewriting, drafting, revising, editing, and publishing and compile them into booklets. (DB)

Essay revisions by four advanced ESL writers with differing first languages were analyzed for specific discourse and linguistic features. The results suggest that such writers often utilize a single system of revision across languages but are capable of adapting some processes to new problems imposed by the second language. (28 references)…

Questions the belief that expository prose is the basic skill that underlies the ideal of academic discourse. Suggests that expository prose and traditional academic discourse are constrained and distorted by ideological values and false conceptions of gender. Argues that writing will seem a much different and richer subject once those values and…

Explores the use of journals as teaching tools. Finds modifications are necessary to accommodate the differences between the psychology professor's goals and the composition teacher's goals. Recommends using dialectical reasoning entries and lists some practical methods to encourage students to think critically. (NL)

Three rationales that have been offered for denying disciplinary status to legal writing as a component of law school curricula are analyzed. It is argued that legal writing deserves such status. Ways in which increased diversity in inquiry modes support the development of legal writing instructional theory are illustrated. (SLD)

Describes and explores the experiences of reconciling the author's Chinese identity with an English identity dictated by the rules of English composition. Shows how the cultural background shapes approaches to writing in English and how writing in English redefines ideological and logical identities. (RS)

Describes the experiences of heterosexual teachers in introducing the topic of sexual preference into a freshman writing course. Expounds on the pitfalls of a writing assignment in which students were asked to describe a conversation with someone about homosexuality. Includes numerous attempts at integrating lesbian and gay experiences into the…

Presents an exercise designed to nullify student claims of subjectivity in the grading of essay examinations. Asks students to grade sample essay questions according to specific criteria. Discusses benefits of the exercise. Provides sample essays and answers, and illustrates the difference between analytical and narrative answers. (RW)

Surveys 221 college basic writing instructors concerning the thinking and writing skills they stress and how receptive basic writers are to learning such skills. Notes a dilemma in that teachers emphasize the mechanical skills students say they want, yet students are not receptive to mastering these skills. (RS)

Writing samples of 295 primary school children improved in productivity, syntax, and level of abstraction from grade one through three. The writing of learning-disabled children who were matched with average reading ability primary-school children indicated no significant differences in productivity, but problems in syntax (especially morphology),…