The search for literature that is of high quality and interest, is written at age-appropriate levels for adolescent readers, addresses social studies topics, and presents multicultural perspectives can be daunting. "Legend of the St Ann's Flood" is a fiction trade book that meets all of these criteria. Its setting in Trinidad and Tobago…

The evolution of a writing project in a language arts methods course provided the author, a teacher educator, an opportunity to reformat a writing assignment so that students would be encouraged to write for an authentic audience. The author reflects on a series of changes made to a writing project assigned as part of a language arts methods…

A secondary English teacher in the Bronx, Marisa Harford describes several self-reflective activities she has designed to improve students' writing skills. Beginning a new school year with activities like Harford's can focus students' efforts all year. (Contains 1 figure.)

Calibrated Peer Review (CPR) is an online tool being used to integrate a writing component in classrooms. In an introductory zoology lecture class, the authors found that CPR-assigned scores were significantly higher than instructor-assigned scores on two of three essay assignments. They also found that neither students' technical-writing skills…

A primary goal of most introductory business and technical communication courses is to introduce students to the idea that the professional communication most of them will engage in is different from the writing they do for academic purposes. This overall idea covers several principles concerning professional writing. However, implementing active…

This article describes the evolution of the author's approach to teaching a secondary social studies methods course over an eighteen-year period. Earlier in his career, the author imposed a reflective, issues-centered approach to teaching social studies as the preferred model of teaching. As a result of a combination of his own professional growth…

Obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD) is a neurobiological condition affecting 1 of every 200 school-age children. OCD greatly affects students' academic, behavioral, and social functioning, and it can lead to additional problem such as depression. To effectively collaborate with other individuals providing appropriate support to students with OCD,…

This article centers the stories of two eighth grade students in the context of a social action literacy project. Their teacher designed curriculum that scaffolded opportunities for them to address English language arts standards while speaking out for social change. The students' responses to the project reveal their civic literacy practices, as…

Students learned a strategy for planning, writing, and evaluating compare-contrast essays. Instruction followed the principles of self-regulated strategy development, which aims to improve knowledge about writing, strategic writing processes, self-regulation, and motivation. Six adolescent students, 3 with learning disabilities in writing and 3…

Student-written cases are powerful pedagogical tools that can lead to improved understanding of business situations, more informed analysis, emphasis on reflection, and clearer expository writing, all of which are critical skills for business students. Cases provide an opportunity for students to enjoy an active learning experience and derive the…

In this article, the authors outline a collaborative writing assignment designed to familiarize students with critical thinking through the rhetoric of science. It is broken down into three parts: (1) teaching context; (2) dialogue assignment; and (3) critical context. Through these pedagogical segments, the authors provide teachers and students…

This article presents an assignment in which students are to research and report on a chemical reaction whose increased or decreased rate is of practical importance. Specifically, students are asked to represent the reaction they have chosen with an acceptable chemical equation, identify a factor that influences its rate and explain how and why it…

Current approaches and trends in writing pedagogy within the composition classroom focus on the development of students' identities through personal, cultural, or disciplinary processes. By employing writing assignments and activities that concentrate on developing certain traits or characteristics of students' identities has led to a "crisis"…

This qualitative study investigates the invented spellings of young EFL writers in terms of the relationship between phonological awareness and internalized grapheme-phoneme principles. Two kindergarteners and two first graders participated in weekly English writing tasks for 14 months. Results obtained from protocols of the students' free writing…

In an action research project, young male students from Sydney, Australia and Richmond, USA contributed to a collaborative writing blog. Both groups of students shared the same text with their class teachers, while using the medium of collaborative blogging, a process which was facilitated and managed by the teacher-librarian. Data was gathered…