This exploratory study was designed to assess the experience of preservice teachers when integrating written language technology and their likelihood of applying that technology in their future classrooms. Results suggest that after experiencing technology integration, preservice teachers are more likely to use it in their future teaching.

As professors of education in an urban community, we wanted to identify mechanisms that would allow young people in the urban core the opportunity to share their unique voices with the world and for us to better understand their views on social justice and social change. The purpose of this paper is to discuss adolescent student perspectives on…

This paper explores dynamics of students' critical consciousness development in the context of a thematically organized service-learning sociology course titled Health, Illness, and Community. The integrated components of the course were designed to cultivate critical consciousness by framing the study of health in terms of social justice issues…

At the undergraduate level, considerable evidence exists to support the use of peer assessment, but there is less research at the graduate level. In the present study, we investigated student perception of the peer assessment experience and the ability of graduate students to provide feedback that is comparable to the instructor and that is…

Essay-writing is generally viewed as the primary learning activity to foster independence and analytical thinking. In this article, we show that independent research projects do not necessarily lead to critical thinking. University-level education on conducting independent projects can, in several respects, counteract enhanced analytical skills.…

The present study examined the use of narrative categories and mental state words in the fictional, personal, and hypothetical stories written by 150 children in the third, fourth, and fifth grades of primary school. There were three main results. First, children were better able to write fictional and hypothetical than personal stories, when…

Writing centers can be staffed wholly or partially by tutors with little training in science writing. This article suggests that an emphasis on scientific rhetoric, not content, may be most useful for training tutors and developing handouts and checklists to aid novice science writers in invention and revision. The article also suggests that a…

This article shares two National Writing Project Teacher Consultants' interest in examining student engagement in writing flash fiction using mentor texts. Our two-week unit centered on two high school freshmen classes (one class identified as "at-risk" and another class identified as "college prep"), and we found the use…

As an often recommended but under-utilized pedagogical strategy, writing in mathematics has many benefits for students. However, creating and grading worthwhile writing projects can be more time-consuming than utilizing more traditional forms of assessment. This paper provides a concrete example of a writing project prompt, questions, directions,…

This article introduces a new course in the Virginia Community College System English Curriculum, "English 114: Scientific Writing." The article briefly reviews the concept of "science rhetoric," then discusses the intended audience and purpose of the course, and explains the basic goals of the course in relation to the…

This study analyzed three analytical essays and three metacognitive reflections written by 36 high school sophomores during one school year. After they had written analytical essays, students wrote reflections in which they described their writing process, explained what they did well, and identified two areas for improvement. The study focused on…

The study aimed at investigating the attitudes of Jordanian undergraduate students towards using computer assisted-language learning (CALL) and its effectiveness in the process of learning the English language. In order to fulfill the study's objective, the researchers used a questionnaire to collect data, followed-up with semi-structured…

Although feedback is often seen as a critical component of the learning process, many open questions about how specific feedback features contribute to the effectiveness of feedback remain--especially in regards to peer feedback of writing. Nelson and Schunn (2009) identified several important features of peer feedback in their nature of feedback…

Lisa Jean Moore describes a class assignment for her Social and Cultural Change course in which she was required to accommodate the material limitations of teaching within a highly regulated and restricted environment. This assignment, carried out in a women's prison, could be adapted for traditional college settings and travel abroad programs,…

Far too few high-school students choose subjects from the natural sciences (NaSc) for their majors in many countries. Even fewer study biology, chemistry or physics at university. Those, that do, often lack training to present and discuss scientific results and ideas in texts. To meet these challenges the center for didactics of biology of Graz…