Diagramming composition as a control structure allows us to see the interaction between process and product and to discover that composition is not a linear process but starts and stops, returns and fixes, and moves ahead. In the interaction of three factors--the real world, the writer, and the reader--a text is produced. The objects, social…

Although modern discourse theory asserts that purpose is most fundamental to writing, it is genuine intention that students' writing most often lacks. Assigned topics compel students to write when the occasion is not genuine and there is no real opportunity to communicate. Research indicates that the two principal modes of writing are extensive,…

Although the nature of topicalization is complex and cannot be easily separated from considerations of syntactic structure and sentence focus, analysis of language usage has indicated that topicalization is more a stylistic than a syntactic process. Topicalization refers to moving a noun phrase (NP) into the initial position of a sentence.…

Two views of coherence in written discourse can be analyzed and then blended into a theory of coherence that selects the best of both views. One view is H. Miller's observation that all coherences are tentative and that the composing process is richer than its products. Another view is A. D. Van Nostrand's suggestion that the two elementary…

To determine what entering college freshmen think they are doing when they write, a study examined the kind of writing that goes on outside the classroom through a one-year case study of 17 students. All written material done outside of class was collected and each writer was interviewed at least once per term. A system of classification was then…

Current views of the writing process are explored, and implications are drawn from them for the teaching of writing skills in the second language class. Certain psychological processes seem to be common to most writing tasks, namely: (1) the conception stage; (2) the incubation stage, in which two mental processes are at work getting the facts and…

Many basic writers who possess minimal composition skills are able to articulate their thoughts but are unable to express these thoughts on paper. The talk-write method of writing rehearsal is an approach that allows these students to experience prewriting and composition processes in an enjoyable way. In the talk-write technique, the student…

Journal writing--an expressive prose that verbalizes the writer's consciousness--helps the student by fostering personal growth, reducing writing apprehension, strengthening prewriting in students' composing processes, and enhancing the development of writing abilities. Journals are places for students to write what they will, for teachers to…

Student writers should be encouraged to transform their initial writer-centered drafts into reader-based prose with discourse that is developed, shaped, and worded to take the reader's needs into consideration. The main features of writer-centered prose are egocentrism, a form that reflects the writer's thought flow, unexpressed causal relations,…

Two opposing views of composition instruction--one emphasizing the creativity and self-involvement of the student (or producer), and one emphasizing the communication produced (the product)--can be reconciled through a perspective that emphasizes the process of composition. It is in process, defined as "the act of composing" or "the act of…

One way to help students develop literary analytical skills is to combine literary transactional theory with focused free-writing activity. By adapting and using Louise Rosenblatt's transactional theory, literature teachers show students the stages by which the literary experience of a creative work is recreated by the student and incorporated…

The organic theory of writing as a process and as a coherent whole implies that writing evolves from a writer's involvement with the subject. Kenneth Burke's theory of logology, the study of words about words, is a theory of composing that has invention at the center and which a writer can apply from beginning to end as needed. Since a student…

Argues that discontinuities between sentences can often be explained in terms of syntactic relationships within individual sentences. (AA)

Describes the 27 events involved in the "Feedback Profile Project," a model evaluation system designed to provide journalism students with quick, systematic feedback about their news writing. (RL)

Uses a linguistic analysis of a sample freshman theme to argue that the motivating context must elicit a genuine speech act, that the students must conceive of their themes as semantic units or unified wholes, and that novice writers must learn to become readers of their own writing. (AA)