A study investigated the effect of word processing on the quality of children's writing. Subjects were 32 fifth-graders in a public school in the suburban town of Livingston, New Jersey. One sample had access to computers in their classroom everyday for writing. The other sample group used computers once a week in the lab; their daily writing…

This essay considers the many benefits of journal writing. It explains how one person learned, during a 26-mile commute, to talk into a tape recorder slowly, leaving sizable pauses between phrases to facilitate transcription later on; how journal writing is a way to catch moments in the day, to describe a scene or to make connections that one…

Children can create pantomimes that will motivate and enhance their story writing. The "Writing through Mime" program has been introduced to some 4500 children, grades kindergarten through 5, in 29 New York City elementary schools, under the auspices of the Learning through an Expanded Arts Program. A step-by-step blueprint was developed…

Written in conjunction with the "Student Expressions" anthology but useful as a resource on its own, this handbook discusses the writing process and the way one teacher used it in a junior high school classroom. The narrative presented in the handbook is a distillation of the different approaches the teacher tried with different groups.…

Many educators are concerned with how writing should be taught, especially in the elementary grades. Many teachers are under the impression that when they have their students write simple sentences using vocabulary words and punctuation marks, they are teaching their students that this is writing. In traditionally taught classes, the elementary…

Organized in eight short sections, this paper presents guidelines for students attending New Hampshire Community Technical College at Manchester for writing term papers and short essays. The paper's sections are: (1) Outline (outlining the paper's contents); (2) Setting the Parameters (containing a definition of a term paper); (3) Sections of a…

A study investigated the writing done by third graders and the processes used when learning to use writing as a meaning-making activity. Four focal students were followed through composing episodes. The classroom was located in a suburban, upper middle class area in Ohio. Less than 3% of the school district population were members of a minority…

Suggesting that the need for creative thinking, creative problem solving, and creative presentations binds the components of the field of communication (journalism, advertising, and public relations), this book presents a guide to proposal thinking and proposal writing for anyone in the field of communication. The book helps readers evaluate,…

During the last decade, the impact of social sciences on educational theory and practice, and anthropology, in particular, have changed the way in which educators view classrooms, teachers, students, and learning itself. Classrooms are subcultures that require particular behaviors, linguistic patterns, and mind sets for members to succeed;…

Implementation of a new program is a complex process of putting ideas into action. Program implementation can be characterized through the identification of interrelated factors which determine the success or failure of implementation of an innovation. Writing as a process has been perceived as a successful teaching methodology for many years, but…

This handbook is one of a set of six which provide a systematic means to help students in grades 4 through 8 learn the process of writing while building specific writing skills. The handbook focuses on sentence skills, and offers 30 reproducible lessons, in a variety of formats, to help students write simple, compound, and complex sentences. The…

This handbook is one of a set of six which provide a systematic means to help students in grades 4 through 8 learn the process of writing while building specific writing skills. The handbook focuses on notetaking and outlining skills, and offers 25 reproducible lessons, in a variety of formats, which give students practical experience in…

To incorporate Robert Pirsig's "Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance" into a course on writing may be to subvert the author's purpose. Pirsig meant for his book to be read aimlessly--like a Zen experience whose goal is only realized after it is achieved. Pirsig might even object to the "teaching" of "Zen and the…

This report focuses on the processes of learning to read and write in the initial phases. Two studies are presented. The first is a review of four theoretical approaches, including Jerome Bruner's representation theory, and theories of concept learning, metacognition, and metalinguistic awareness. The purpose of the literature study was to examine…

This paper explores the nature of a fifth/sixth grade New York City teacher's image of good writing, its effect on teacher-student interactions, and its influence on students. These three aspects are interwoven through a discussion of writing from personal experience, selecting a particular form for a specific audience, and including elements of…