There has been a shift of emphasis in research on the teaching of writing. The focus changed from the products of writing to writing processes. This has strong implications for instruction. Writing curriculum should be based on the organization of the cognitive processes involved in writing skills. (Author/VM)

Twenty college students, naive to Blissymbols, were asked to "guess" the meaning of 64 Blissymbols presented without their word gloss. The influence of symbol representativeness and the concreteness of associated word labels on the symbols'"guessability" was analyzed. The guessability of a symbol's gloss was significantly…

Describes a six-week program in which a teacher did not talk to her students but rather wrote all assignments and questions on the board. Concludes that the experiment improved student self-reliance and helped them to read and interpret instructions. (FL)

Describes a database for French spelling and grammar which has been working since 1984 in the city of Strasbourg. The database is accessed by the public through MINITEL terminals which are connected to common telephones. Provides examples of typical use and includes sample screen displays. (JDH)

The articles and papers included here all relate to the issue of Chinese characters and the continuing debate over whether it is difficult or easy to learn and to use them. (RM)

To make it easier for Chinese children to learn how to read, the Chinese writing system is being changed. The experimental approach of combining Chinese characters and pinyin is currently being carried out in Chinese primary schools. How this approach works in teaching children to read is described. (RM)

Argues that a culture's rhetoric constitutes an interface where the prescriptions of the language meet the practices of the culture. Attempts to identify and suggest some of the differences between Chinese and Western rhetoric that confront an American writing teacher in China. (EL)

Two experiments were conducted to test the hypothesis that first-grade beginning readers could evaluate the referential-communicative adequacy of simple, two-word messages better if they received oral-plus-written messages rather than oral-only messages. Results indicated that oral-plus-written messages were significantly easier for children to…

Finds no significant differences for immediate learning for students presented material orally and those presented the same material in written form. Shows, however, that students in the oral presentation mode performed significantly better than those in the reading mode on measures of delayed learning. (FL)

Presents an experiment which assessed the effectiveness of teaching written French to university students with computer assisted instruction (CAI). Results indicate that the CAI drill and practice lessons didn't effect any greater achievement improvement than ordinary instruction, but students had favorable attitudes toward CAI. (MBR)

Surveys research on role of audience in discourse in a series of related disciplines, including cognitive psychology, composition, speech communication, rhetoric, and philosophy. Concludes that writing teachers can achieve a sophisticated, complex understanding of nature and role of audience in written discourse only if they are aware of both…

This article discusses: (1) evolution of the concept of selective underachievement in reading; (2) evidence that reading disorders are linked to written language and speech problems; and (3) anatomical, physiological, and biochemical aspects of brain research. Specialized medical instruments do not yet replace good clinical observation for…

An approach to the teaching of composition undertaken by the University of South Carolina writing laboratory is described in which the objective is to educate students and teachers in the composition process and to discover more about how writing is learned. Focus is on helping people learn to think. (LBH)

The back-to-basics movement and arguments by its proponents are examined with emphasis on proficiency in writing skills. Composition course requirements are discussed along with the need of instructors to teach semantic and logical skills. (LBH)

Mary S. Erbaugh has compiled this volume to examine the so-called "ideographic myth" from a variety of perspectives. Through this multidisciplinary collection of articles, we learn how the myth has come about, what sort of theory and empirical evidence have been generated to refute it, and how this myth has stubbornly persisted to hamper progress…