This article explores the use of historical fiction as a means of undertaking a historical enquiry into the experiences of refugees and evacuees with Key Stage 2 and 3 pupils. The authors reflect on the reasons why people have come to Britain before focussing on specific circumstances associated with World War 2. This is undertaken through the use…

Despite American schools administrators' refusal to accept the language of African-American students and their overzealousness to frame language and literacy skills in terms of an "achievement gap," African-American Vernacular English (AAVE) is the language of African-American imagination and reality. This article discusses the characteristics of…

This magazine contains literary pieces/writings by 31 new writers in the southeastern United States. The works span a broad range of topics: remembering times past, reflections on special people, social concerns, family life, and work. Authors' comments or autobiographical notes and photographs accompany the pieces. Titles include the following:…

The 15 essays in this book reveal the complexity of teaching writing, with some contributors calling into question the gap between classroom theory and classroom practice as seen through students' and tutors' perspectives. The book analyzes the cornerstone of theory and proposes a reexamination of some taken-for-granted composition practices.…

In hopes of discovering how to respond to her students' work in a way that heads them toward meaningful revision, a creative writing teacher singles out several categories of student fiction she has trouble responding to and pinpoints common shortcomings of students' early drafts, the way students respond to comments regarding revisions, and genre…

This practicum project used a combination of strategies to improve creative thinking skills in second- and third-grade gifted students. Sixteen students were targeted for the intervention. Over a 12-week implementation period, students participated in 90-minute interventions twice weekly. The intervention was comprised of 30-minute creative…

This publication contains 37 stories, vignettes, and poems written by participants in the British Columbia Buildings Corporation Workplace Language Program. The pieces center on family, work, people, and places and were written by people who decided to learn how to improve their language skills. They represent slices of employees' lives as they…

This paper briefly describes a unit of study or program called "Africa Revisited," which gives students an opportunity to read African folktales and take part in making them come alive through sociodramatics, improvisations, puppetry, and creative writing. The paper's five main sections are as follows: (1) Project Overview; (2) Project…

Written by and about the homeless, the Chicago newspaper "StreetWise" has potential for use in creative writing classes. An urban community college instructor uses the newspaper to provide material from which her students, many of whom are at or below the poverty level, can derive ideas for writing and to raise her students' level of…

Many freshmen come to English courses thinking that they generally dislike poetry and that in particular they dislike writing critical essays about poetry. Two strategies which are effective in helping students overcome their own negative perceptions are to allow students to: (1) engage in transactional reader response; and (2) explore poetry…

Student Expressions of Ethnic and Cultural Harmony in New York City is a program designed to give students in grades 3-6 the opportunity to promote their visions of New York City as a center of harmony and understanding amid a wide range of racial, cultural, religious and linguistic diversity through the arts, both communication and visual. This…

Intended for both experienced and novice K-12 teachers, this book invites teachers to bring new life into the reading-writing workshop and calls for teachers to push back the frontiers of their thinking about teaching writing and reading. The book includes chapters on establishing courses of study in which children read and write memoir, picture…

A study examined the subtle impact of word processing (used alone) on the way students approach their writing tasks. Nine elementary school teachers were trained in techniques of naturalistic observation and received a kit containing important guidelines for their observational task, daily log sheets, and journal forms. The teachers then observed…

The cognitive skills associated with the writing of fiction and poetry are equally important in analytical and evaluative writing. Excluding them from freshman composition in particular discourages the students from developing a genuine mastery of critical writing skills. Teachers of college freshmen should not define "creative" as the…

This paper describes the creative activity of two first graders and identifies moments of creative activity that reflect the integration of strands of experience. Children's and adults' creativity are compared. Topics include: (1) the role of novelty in art; (2) the creative act as an interaction of individual, product, and culture; and (3) the…