Both curricular reformers and writing specialists believe a connection exists between critical thinking and writing, however two obstacles have prevented any conclusion from emerging. One is that there is no established shared understanding of what "critical thinking" means. The other is that no one knows how to measure it, even though…

A process oriented technical writing course was devised at the University of Alaska to counteract the "forms" approach and to include peer critiques and student participation in class grading. Modifications to the standard syllabus included (1) student analyses of their own writing processes through literacy autobiographies, (2) student…

A case study examined the writing problems of Jay, a freshman composition student at the University of Massachusetts, to determine how teachers should handle students whose composing styles are not suited to writing with word processors. Interviews, classroom observation, and careful analyses of Jay's essays in progress and logsheets were…

A study examined the effects of intervention strategies on the revisions minority students made in narrative essays in a process-oriented classroom. Thirteen African-American and Latino students enrolled in a private boarding school in New England participated in the research. The effect of teacher interventions was explored through two…

Intended for teaching assistants and non-writing specialists to whom students come for help in preparing assigned writing papers, this guide suggests questions and comments to ask such students to help them clarify what is happening, or not happening, in their writing, and in the thinking which this writing reveals. The guide roughly parallels…

The 23 original essays on sentence combining in this volume range in focus from classroom methodology and effectiveness, through theoretical issues and syntactic constructions, to current issues in the field. The essays and their authors are as follows: (1) "The Role of the Elaborated Dominant Nominal in the Measurement of Conceptual and…

A course of study was researched, designed, and implemented to improve the writing of fifth-grade students. Objectives of the program were to develop more positive feelings about writing while increasing the quantity, quality, and variety of writing. Cooperative learning and process writing was discussed with the participants, their parents, and…

The best way to teach writing is to make it the way to learn something else. Instructors need to look at written communication as it is used in real life. When students take pains with their writing, it is because what they have to say is important to them. The students' need to communicate a particular meaning for a particular purpose guides them…

Focusing on talk as the vehicle through which the reading and writing processes can become more interactive and can more closely approach the processes of learning, the lessons presented in this booklet provide examples of how teachers can construct learning strategies to help children "talk their way into meaning" against a framework of…

Focusing on purpose in the writing of college freshmen, a study examined the writing processes and how they related to the conceptions of purpose of four freshmen enrolled in a composition course at Indiana University. Discourse-based interviews were conducted before and after the students completed three tasks designed to vary their choice of…

Contrastive rhetoric theory, an extension of contrastive grammar, holds that the rhetorical predispositions of a student's native language will interfere with attempts to learn the rhetoric of a second language; and that because speakers of different languages think differently, they organize paragraphs differently, a situation which influences…

Based on knowledge gleaned from eight years of research on children's writing development, this book focuses on the teaching of writing to children in the elementary school. The first section of the book deals with the essentials in teaching writing, and the establishment of a classroom that nurtures and supports growth in writing. The second…

For many years, educators from kindergarten to twelfth grade have approached the teaching of vocabulary, spelling, grammar, punctuation, and so forth as isolated skills, unconnected with the everyday use of reading, speaking, and writing. Such practices are now viewed with less favor, as researchers and educators approach reading and writing as…

An introductory course assignment for writing in English as a second language consists of four steps: (1) in a survey, students assess their own writing skills in both their native language and English; (2) each student interviews two people, one who writes frequently in the student's native language and one who writes frequently in English, about…

Writing techniques espoused by Peter Elbow, applied to the teaching of writing in advertising copywriting classes can help students develop into better writers, generating better copy ideas. The shift of focus from writing a finished piece the first time to concentrating on the process of writing allows for a freer flow of ideas and creativity.…