Shares thoughts about a recent teaching experience that may speak to two current and related issues of importance to English studies, those of part-time and adjunct staffing and of the full-time faculty's responsibility for and involvement in the design, supervision, and instruction of lower-division courses. Considers the reintegration of tenured…

Conducts case studies of proficient undergraduate writers from working-class backgrounds in the context of a course preparing sophomore and junior students to be tutors for first-year basic writers. Finds that students explained their experiences suggesting a greater degree of agency, an awareness of themselves as writers in a "contact zone," and…

Notes that beyond the challenges of technology and time, online teaching also elicits unexpected introspection about the role as instructors, the changing relationships with colleagues, and the evolving perceptions about the students. Outlines five achievements and challenges associated with online first-year composition. (SG)

Presents and discusses a study of 129 first-year composition students that identifies both their expectations and frustrations. Focuses on how such results demonstrate students' ambivalence about classes and educators as well as their ability to function as effective writers. (SG)

Claims a consumerism model manifests itself in first-year composition programs. Discusses the academic situation generally and English Departments specifically to explore how the current reform movement clashes with postmodern values in this discipline. (NH)

The purpose of this paper is to present a detailed analysis of the style of exemplary first-year writing in order to establish and understand those features of written discourse that first-year writing teachers most value and reward. Having established the stylistic features of exemplary first-year writing, the paper goes on to provide first-year…

Working with first-year students at Purdue University, the author, a composition instructor, joined efforts with librarian Alexius Smith-Macklin to explore the efficacy of a collaborative approach to freshman writing instruction at the university level. Combining expertise from the Purdue programs of English education, theory and cultural studies,…

The practice of treating students as valuable contributors to the educational process can be traced back at least as far as Socrates. Unfortunately, the predominate pattern of pedagogy in the United States has been one of exclusion. Those instructors who are part of recent movement to help their students enter the academic discourse face the…

A study examined college students' responses to writing tasks that were created by their instructors--writing tasks that constituted an important part of the instructors' course designs and that were presented to students as an integral part of the curriculum. In all, approximately 4800 independent evaluations of 796 essays were analyzed. The…

Composition teachers and researchers recognize the difficulty young writers, especially females, face as they enter postsecondary education and attempt to learn the language of the academy. Addressing academic audiences "takes confidence and authority, qualities that are often challenged in women because of their historical exclusion from and…

An instructor's teaching practices have been influenced by Edward T. Hall's theory in "Beyond Culture," which begins with the notion that "what is known least well and is therefore in the poorest position to be studied is what is closest to oneself," the "unconscious patterns that control us." This wisdom has been…

As more and more universities and composition classrooms add computer capabilities, the Internet is becoming an increasingly valuable part of the freshman composition course. The Internet can help students do research, learn and understand different perspectives on a given topic, and open their eyes to the potential of the technology. The most…

A video tape of a freshman composition student at the University of Arizona shows the difficulty she has faced in writing classes because of her black dialect. Her instructor points out that the student, after some of the readdings in class, recognizes that she has learned code switching on her own to survive in the educational system; this…

English instructors working towards diversifying the curriculum, increasing multicultural discussions in the classroom, and encouraging interdisciplinary approaches to awakening consciousness can learn much from their students' interest in popular music. MTV and VH1 have special significance for students and can be easily incorporated into a…

Frank Aydelotte is best remembered for developing in the 1930s and 1940s the nation's most innovative and influential honors program, based on the education he received as a Rhodes Scholar at Oxford. As coordinator of freshman English at Indiana University, Aydelotte attacked the dominant Harvard model of instruction while promoting a method…