This book describes and discusses the International Association for the Evaluation of Educational Achievement (IEA) study of writing in Sweden. The chapters are as follows: (1) Introduction; (2) Content and Planning of the Study; (3) Schools, Teachers and Pupils in Sweden 1985; (4) The Teaching of Writing; (5) Compositions and Scoring; (6)…

Designed to assess teachers' attitudes toward teaching writing, evaluating writing, and teaching course content through writing, the first part of this two-part measure is a Likert-type scale containing 35 items representing the instrument's three purposes. The second part asks for professional opinions in 12 categories, including extent of…

Computers, if programed to respond to writer-generated content with heuristic strategies, can guide the writer in the prewriting stage. Heuristics are problem solving strategies that can aid the writer in exploring a topic either through a systematic posting of relevant questions or through an unsystematic process of free-association. To date the…

This project is a historical and topical search into handwriting evaluation. It includes a statement of the problem; a justification; definitions; a bibliography listed in historical order with annotations on 36 books and articles; and a summary and evaluation of the literature. The conclusion of the paper discusses the importance of being aware…

To help business writers and writing teachers think more specifically about problems of writing collaboration, a study examined and analyzed a group writing project in the Auldouest Insurance Company (pseudonym) Department of Corporate Communication. The collaborative writing of the two page executive letter of the company's annual report involved…

As a response to the increasing support for linking information about the role of writing in the lives of children to writing instruction in schools, a research instrument was developed that illuminates children's concepts about writing (who writes, what is written, where people write, why they write, and how they view the writing process).…

A study examined attitudes toward writing that affect productivity and the extent of their influence. Subjects, 160 engineers practicing in the Chattanooga, Tennessee region, completed a questionnaire concerning writing attitudes, including anxiety and confidence, and levels of productivity. Findings show that confident engineers produce…

To develop a theory of invention that would include both generation and selection of material for written composition, the four major current theories of invention were considered. Since only one--prewriting--included a selection component and was limited in several ways, a psychotherapeutic theory--focusing--was adapted to the composing process…

A review of the literature concerning ethnographic studies of writing reveals a number of reasons for the writing that people do. Some studies of writing in the schools found that what is considered "writing" is not really writing at all and that the majority of students consider the teacher to be their sole audience. Other studies…

Composing is controlled by information feedback from prior behavior which serves to influence future behavior. This model posits movement toward a desired end product through a continual interchange of writing and examining and evaluating what has been written against internal standards. A study was conducted to determine the extent to which…

Two experiments were conducted to assess the influences of two individual variables--verbal aptitude and writing apprehension--on the production of persuasive arguments by college students. Subjects were 47 college students who wrote preliminary and final drafts of persuasive letters. Results of both experiments revealed that the students' verbal…

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…

This examination of an evaluation of writing based on process rather than on product argues that one of the primary functions of evaluation as a part of teaching should be to diagnose the writing strategies that underlie a writer's current performance, not just textual problems. The first half of the paper discusses the various ways teachers use…

Presents a continuum of composition teaching methods ranging from whole-to-part approaches (stressing free writing and developing voice) to part-to-whole approaches (stressing spelling, vocabulary, and usage). Recounts an evaluation of these methods by preservice teachers who favored the part-to-whole approaches. (JG)

Outlines the results of a followup study done in 1986 (10 years after the initial study) on why high school teachers can't effectively teach writing. The study finds that, despite reductions in class size, somewhat better teacher preparation, and higher awareness of administrators, the barriers to effective teaching of writing have not changed…