Prescribes a sequential approach when teaching techniques of creative writing and self-expression at a teachers workshop. (RL)

Describes a study (involving 360 fourth grade students and their 12 teachers) of responses to children's personal writing. (DD)

Students' collection of divorce stories were the focus of this writing project. Sample stories are included. (HOD)

Describes several practical ideas for using poetic expression in an elementary school. Notes that counselors can promote increased sensitivity and insight among children while assisting them in achieving greater cognitive, emotional, and behavioral awareness of themselves, others, and their environment, by using poetry. (ABB)

Suggests that writing for children (and being a children's librarian) is held in low esteem because the field is dominated by women and the focus is on children. Concludes that the values that children's literature is assumed to contain--nurturing values associated with women--threaten the dominant culture. (NKA)

Presents the viewpoint of a teacher and writer of young adult fiction. Relates how she gets ideas for novels from her own students and bases the characters on them and on young people like them. (NKA)

Discusses a teacher's experience writing poems with eight third and fifth graders pulled from their regular classrooms. Provides transcripts of the two poems written with the students. (SRT)

Reveals ways to help students learn that writing can be similar to play, in that they can use their imaginations to create new settings and even new worlds. Suggests using toys, imaginary trips, and including friends in stories as inspiration for writing. (SKC)

Describes a teaching method in which high school sophomores (1) read A. Munro's "Connection," a short story connecting the author to her family origins; (2) interview relatives about their personal history; and (3) compose vignettes based on the notes collected during a three-week period. Provides numerous questions and prompts used to help the…

Describes instructional and departmental forces creating the following problems for undergraduate creative writing teachers: (1) they hold an uneasy position in the English department hierarchy; (2) courses are radically different from creative writing courses in either high school or graduate school; and (3) instruction has lagged behind…

Describes a writing assignment in which students rewrite literary classics or fairy tales from a new perspective (i.e. making an originally minor character the protagonist, or putting the original story into a different century). (MM)

Suggests ways of encouraging young children to write that are preferable to forcing them to try to have their work professionally published. Points out negative aspects of young children writing for publication, and offers more constructive alternatives. (SKC)

Writer of fantasy novels discusses the origins of her heroines and characterizes them as strong, passionate women who determine their own fate. (ARH)

Notes that before mapping stories, children may need help in defining story elements, and offers a guide to act as a transition to creating stories. (JC)

Uses repetition/change patterns of surprise found in sports, music, history etc., to teach grade school and high school students the concept as an effective device for writing poetry. (NH)