To motivate slow learners and discipline-problem pupils to improve their writing skills, a reinforcement program was developed in Baltimore, Maryland, modeled on an earlier program which created a school environment operated like the business world. Upon successful completion of assigned tasks, the experimental group, 24 eighth graders, were given…

The five studies reported in this journal were undertaken by classroom English teachers to encourage teachers to conduct and read educational research, and to generate curiosity about recent research in the teaching of English. Articles are (1) "Can Teachers Ignore Mechanical Errors in Composition?"; (2) "What Do Freshmen and Sophomores Like to…

A delineation of the differences between speaking and writing should clarify the functions and possible future of prose. Speech has a speaker to provide language with inflectional stress and a visible audience to respond immediately to that language. On the other hand, prose ("an art of written language")--which is separated in time from an…

A study examined the use of literary models in teaching written composition to children, and, as secondary goals, examined the relationships between written composition and such factors as age, sex, and intelligence. Four fifth-grade classes in Clarke County, Georgia, completed Sequential Tests of Educational Progress (STEP) Writing Tests and…

In this study, an evaluation was made of a second grade experimental written composition program based on the social and psychological nature of children, on principles of written composition, and on effective classroom procedures. The distinguishing feature of the experiment, which involved 82 children, was the use of chalkboard compositions to…

This study analyzed the effect of various stimuli on the number and kinds of words produced, the number and length of grammatical structures formed, and the quality of writing produced under four stimulus conditions. Third-grade students from Clarke County, Georgia, wrote compositions after (1) being asked to write a story (minimal stimulus); (2)…

This study was undertaken to determine whether an oral-aural approach to remedial composition instruction for college students would be superior to the traditional grammar and rhetoric approach. For one semester, four classes of remedial writing at Jefferson College in Missouri served as experimental groups in which ideas and sound were stressed…

This study partially replicated Moss's "A Study of the Effect of Selected Methods of Instruction Designed to Increase Originality in Written Expression," except for the fact that this investigator taught a 5th grade and an 11th grade class for most of a school year. Some of the conclusions of the study were: no particular teaching technique was…

The purpose of this study was to determine if syntactic maturity, as measured by T-unit length, clause length, and clauses per T-unit, and if the level of reading comprehension, as measured by cloze tests and a standardized reading test, of one group each of selected fifth, seventh, and ninth graders could be influenced by the students completing…

The purpose of this pilot study was to collect information on the feasibility of designing a controlled experimental project to test the effectiveness of a new grammar called "sector analysis" on improving student writing. The fourth, seventh, and ninth grade materials used in this study were based on this new approach to teaching…

This research project was designed to analyze by quantitative methods a corpus of writing produced by four groups of American college students enrolled in German courses and by one group of professional German writers. Analysis was undertaken in order to determine whether or not significant quantitative differences in the use of selected syntactic…

The appendix to the report of the minimum objective system of the Hinesburg Elementary School (Vermont) includes language arts objectives from kindergarten through grade 6. Most objectives are presented in the format of condition (or task), student behavior, and criteria. Also included are schedules for language arts activities throughout the year…

The course will contribute to competency in all office occupations by equipping students with the basic skills needed to apply grammar, punctuation, capitalization, abbreviations, and number style to simple business communications. Offered as an elective, the course is intended for 12th grade students and has no prerequisites. Performance…

This bibliography is a first edition designed to aid the work of the Textual Communication Research Unit and will be followed by a further edition in two years' time. Sources relevant to textual communication, except those pertaining exclusively to broadcasting or children's texts, are arranged as either pertaining to language or to visual design.…

By identifying literary devices found in adult literature and then analyzing children's writing for these same devices, it was hoped that new insight would be gained into the elements of children's writings. Five stories per grade level were selected from grades two through six from seven Memphis elementary schools. The children's stories were…