A study was conducted of 4 university instructors teaching a first-year composition class and of 16 of their students (4 for each instructor) randomly selected. Parts of the interviews, parts of the think-aloud protocols, and parts of the instructors' written comments are examined--the focus is on the way that students and teachers approach…

Literary societies, while dying or already defunct in Eastern U.S. schools, still played significant roles in 19th-century frontier colleges like Butler University in Indianapolis, Indiana, and it is the thesis of the paper that a systematic investigation of the document left by these societies, although largely neglected by historians, will have…

A study examined the role of critical reflection in one particular writing context--that of collaborative planning. Subjects, 22 college freshmen enrolled in two core composition courses, were audiotaped as they planned course papers with a peer. Students formed pairs each consisting of a "writer" and a "partner" (supporter).…

This article analyzes post-accident investigation reports from a feminist perspective, showing how a feminist interpretation can change the way technical writers look at expertise and evidence. In comparing formal documentation of mine inspection reports with women's testimony about conditions in the mines, the article shows: (1) how the…

A study explored the efficacy of the general semantic technique of E-Prime (a technique for increasing awareness of abstraction through the deliberate deletion of all forms of the verb "to be") through a study of copula deletion (omission of auxiliary verbs) and flaming (the fervent exchange of emotionally charged messages) in electronic…

A study investigated whether peer tutoring in writing would lead to writing improvement. In a kindergarten-first grade classroom three children were tutored by fellow students, while three other students worked alone. The children's writing samples were collected and evaluated in three areas: spelling, longer sentences, and greater number of words…

There are four problems in modern composition bibliography that result directly from the continuing research paradigm instability in the field. The first problem is that of definition. Composition is a hybrid, practical sort of field, with very ill-defined and shifting boundaries. The recent extension of composition from "formal writing…

A study examined whether male and female writers would respond in identifiably different ways to the same writing task, and whether a content analysis of the discourse produced for these writing tasks would reveal distinctly "male" and "female" concerns. It was hypothesized that themes relating to autonomy would appear more often in men's essays,…

To address the questions of whether writers create their audiences and, if so, how, a case study of three skilled student writers sought to elicit the students' tacitly held knowledge about composing and audience. The students wrote an essay that they were told would be published in a campus anthology, and then responded to questions in taped…

The handwriting of 756 eleventh grade students was evaluated to determine whether their handwriting styles would be characteristic of the manuscript or cursive styles they had been taught. Subjects had been taught Zaner-Bloser manuscript in primary grades with a transition to cursive in third grade. Analysis of handwriting samples revealed a wide…

Investigating the common perception that collaborative writing in composition classes is being used primarily with finished products, an informal survey was conducted in which writing instructors who used collaborative learning estimated the amount of time they allowed for each stage of the writing process (Prewriting/Invention, Focusing/Thesis,…

Investigating the differences between students' conventional responses to the identification of writing topics and their responses to matters of real concern (as revealed through the use of "lifewriting" processes in the classroom), an exploratory study surveyed 455 eleventh and twelfth grade students at three large urban high schools.…

In order to examine the differential availability of attention between the self-written text and standard text conditions, changes in error detection performance of unskilled hearing writers were compared with those of profoundly deaf writers. Subjects, 10 profoundly, pre-lingually deaf college freshmen with no additional handicaps and a…

An exploratory study investigated how writers represent their task to themselves before beginning to write. Using data from verbal protocols, the initial plans of 12 writers (5 experts and 7 student writers) who were working on an expository writing task were examined. The protocols were coded for types of planning. Independent measures of the…

For the 1987-1988 North Carolina Annual Testing Program in the area of writing assessment, public school students in grades 6 and 8 were tested on the composing characteristics of main idea, supporting detail, organization and coherence. A total of 78,045 sixth-grade students wrote a clarification composition focusing on their favorite place to…