Offering information to help parents understand how writing is taught in classrooms that use the 6-Trait Model for writing assessment and writing instruction, this handbook describes the model and how parents can provide the kind of support at home that would make classroom instruction even more effective. Sections of the handbook are: "A…

To better facilitate students' learning how to write with authority, instructors need to look more carefully at what it is they do when they teach composition courses. They must look critically at what they accept as "natural" or "true" about good writing practices. A training session for the graders of the Freshmen Placement…

A document prepared by the Commission on Composition in the early 1970s, "The Student's Right to Write," has some usefulness for contemporary practitioners of writing instruction. The report reflects the strong initiative arising in the '70s to rethink the beliefs and practices then prevalent in the field of English teaching. At the…

A study was conducted of 4 university instructors teaching a first-year composition class and of 16 of their students (4 for each instructor) randomly selected. Parts of the interviews, parts of the think-aloud protocols, and parts of the instructors' written comments are examined--the focus is on the way that students and teachers approach…

The Liberal Studies Assessment Portfolio program was instituted at San Diego State University in July 1992 in response to California's requirement that prospective elementary school teachers demonstrate subject matter competency. Since many liberal studies majors transfer to San Diego State University at the beginning of their junior year, most of…

This book has an easy-to-follow-format. It supports teachers through six workshops by sharing specific strategies, procedures, and materials that worked best for students and teachers in classroom writing workshops. The book discusses the routines that helped organize and support a workshop; and presents strategies for anecdotal record-keeping,…

This book presents specific grading strategies and explicit instructions for using them while offering options which allow teachers to place the grading of writing into a communication context. The book introduces and explains a wide range of evaluation strategies used by classroom teachers to arrive at grades. Samples of student writing accompany…

Seventy-four college students participated in a peer review assignment. Subjects were asked to write a draft of a three-page paper, distribute copies to three peer reviewers, revise their papers using the resulting feedback from each of the three peer reviewers, and then prepare and submit a final paper. Reviews were scored for the quality and…

Designed to assess students' attitudes toward writing, this scale contains 40 items representing three categories: preference for writing, perception of writing, and process of writing. Respondents circle one of five points ranging from "almost always" to "almost never." Validity, reliability, and normative data are included.…

Designed to identify and tabulate the various cohesive ties in writing, this instrument is a tabulation sheet for recording all instances of cohesive ties. The sheet includes columns for recording the cohesive word, the number of the sentence in which it appears, the referent of the cohesive word, and the number of the sentence in which it…

A feedback technique for second-language compositions is that of "reformulation." This procedure consists of having a native writer of the target language rewrite the learner's essay, preserving all the learner's ideas. The learner then compares this version with the original version, complete with teacher corrections. To determine the benefits of…

In response to growing concern about the lack of basic writing skills, this paper presents an overview of the issues involved in selecting a method for the assessment of students' writing skills. After general criteria for determining the appropriateness of a writing evaluation procedure are outlined, the merits and limitations of objective tests…

This report first presents a brief analysis of the "Standards for Educational and Psychological Testing" that provides the basis for an argument that the test user/purchaser must see the possibilities in uncommon types of assessment before any test developer/publisher is likely to make them available. Next, six criteria (theoretical…

The two parts of Alberta's sixth-year French achievement test are in test booklet form. Part A, the writing test, requires the development of a composition from a story for which the beginning is provided. The booklet contains instructions concerning the procedure and the criteria to be used in evaluating the composition. Space is provided for a…

Intended to familiarize persons with the scoring standards and criteria used for the 6th grade version of the Georgia Criterion-Referenced Writing Test, this scoring manual is in eight sections: (1) an introduction to the scoring dimensions and scale points; (2) definitions of the four scale points; (3) definitions of scoring dimensions and…