Examines some of the research on reasons for teachers' diverse reactions to student writing. Also looks at research on student reactions to teacher responses to their writing. (HTH)

Presents results of a study on how accurately instructors in composition identified various kinds of errors. (RL)

Suggests that nonfictive writing typically employs a vocabulary different from that used in works of fiction. Characterizes the vocabulary of essays, asserts that students are usually not given enough assistance in acquiring such vocabulary, and offers steps for giving students help in acquiring the vocabulary of essays. (RL)

Reports of classroom research on the effectiveness of sentence combining as a teaching technique. Notes the value of in-class research. (RL)

Presents findings from an in-depth study of children's composing processes in an effort to explain handwriting performance in relation to child development and the writing process. (GT)

Provides a brief review of sentence combining development and research, and suggests some future directions for the technique. (RL)

Summarizes a study of five unskilled college writers, focusing especially on one of the five, and discusses the findings in light of current pedagogical practice and research design. (DD)

Investigates specific writing skills of both native and nonnative business students to see whether traditional instruction in grammar prepares students for business communication classes and the corporate world. Finds that, although most students passed objective grammar and punctuation tests (and the two groups showed no statistical differences),…

Investigates current beliefs and practices of elementary and secondary teachers regarding using writing to teach mathematics. Finds that teachers indicated strong belief in the benefits of using writing to teach mathematics, yet actually used writing activities less than once a week. Notes reasons by which these instructional decisions are…

Follows the development, from fifth grade through eighth grade, of a student poet, who can teach educators what it means to "feel expressed." Offers new ways to think about who children are, what they need to say, and what they need to be taught. Discusses the possibilities of poetry for gaining access to children's deepest capacities for…

Investigates young children's literacy activity within play settings designed to reflect authentic literacy contexts in children's real-world environment. Finds that, in the course of play activities, children demonstrated declarative knowledge about literacy (e.g. names of literacy objects), procedural knowledge, and strategic knowledge. Suggests…

Examines how conformity to gender or gender expectations can affect evaluation. Finds that women who write either traditional or non-traditional perspectives generally receive the same grade, but a non-traditional perspective is more likely to receive criticism. Finds also that the same is true of men but to a lesser degree. (TB)

Uses cloze techniques to examine the development of writers' memory for their own texts. Finds 70% accuracy on writer's cloze to be a consistent cutoff score for detection of plagiarism. Suggests that teachers should be aware that students remember their self-generated texts very well and that these standards can be used to detect and deter…

Examines student responses to their teachers' written comments on their papers. Finds that students are equally interested in getting responses on content, purpose and organization as on sentence structure, wording and correctness; and students prefer specific comments with explanations over negative comments or comments that seek to control their…

Examines how writers used the World Wide Web to create and change documents, and how changing documentation challenged the production models and processes at a supercomputing company. (RS)