Project aims were to learn what college freshmen knew of the late 19th and 20th century presidents and to determine the students' writing level. During the first class of each of five semesters, students enrolled in an American History Since 1865 course were asked to write one paragraph about any president in the time period 1865-1981. Due to time…

The writing done in a biology class has a great deal in common with the writing done in the humanities and the social sciences. Because the scientific method of investigation requires the student to examine and understand the physical world by asking questions and then answering them through empirical investigation, clear and concise writing is…

The occurrence of discrepant, or non-contiguous, scores during holistic scoring of writing proficiency is usually blamed on variables of the test reader or external factors. It is hypothesized that characteristics of the essays themselves sometimes may generate discrepancies in essay scoring. Data from 152 essays of college sophomores in teacher…

This study examines differences and similarities in the information provided by direct and indirect measures of writing from the Collegiate Assessment of Academic Proficiency (CAAP). The indirect measure was a 72-item multiple-choice test, while the direct measure involved responding to two essay prompts. The 40-minute multiple-choice test can be…

Writing instructors teaching in computer classrooms recognize that the goals and content of these writing courses have changed since precomputer days. While the emphasis is still on writing, skills related to producing texts in electronic environment are also being taught. Technology is changing the nature of writing instruction, the writing…

Self-assessment occurred daily in the act of learning in a professional writing class, which met in a computer-networked writing classroom. Strategies for self-assessment were based on James Britton's "expressive writing" and Peter Elbow's believing game. Students recorded and assessed this active learning in a Writer's Notebook (a…

A comparison of responses, gathered in 1970 and 1987, to the "Composition Opinionnaire" which was prepared by the Commission on Composition of the National Council of Teachers of English to meet the critical needs of schools in 1970, was designed to determine any change or lack of change in teachers' values concerning the described…

To link writing assessment more closely to writing pedagogy, a project added a process instrument--a self-evaluation or "postwrite"--to a formal holistic writing assessment. Subjects were 348 freshman composition students at Goucher College. The postwrite asked students, after they had finished writing an essay, to answer four questions…

Beyond providing insights into evoking, evaluating, and encouraging children's poetry, this book may give other poets and writers insights for their own writing. The 17 chapters discuss the following topics: (1) teaching poetry in the schools; (2) relating personal memories in poetry; (3) writing poems about animals; (4) using the chant; (5)…

Research was conducted into the specific characteristics of brief, impromptu essay writing. A random sample of 806 essays was taken from the more than 80,000 written for the College Board's English Composition Achievement Test (ECT) in 1979. Using a special taxonomy of 20 writing characteristics, these essays were subjected to a second reading in…

Awareness of audience is of major importance in rhetoric, but most students who come to a writing center need help in recognizing and accommodating an audience for their work. Standard warnings from rhetoric texts and writing instructors not to write for the instructor not withstanding, it is the job of the writing center staff to help the student…

This paper presents 40 writing assignments and 16 scoring guides used by elementary and junior high school teachers who participated in a writing research and resources project in connection with primary trait scoring. Not all of the assignments presented were originated by the teachers: some were taken or adapted from a textbook; occasionally…

Noting that writers frequently use reading aloud to evaluate written drafts, two studies were conducted to determine the extent to which holistic scores assigned by readers to college freshman essays correlated with holistic scores assigned by listeners. One study used 39 narrative essays, the other used 39 expository essays. The results of the…

A writing-across-the-curriculum program has been initiated at the East Campus of Pima Community College in an effort to improve student literacy. The program operates in the following manner: (1) faculty in all disciplines on campus are asked to get involved in the program, those who participate being paid a one-time fee of $100 for their efforts;…

Since acceptable writing is essential to success in job training programs and in many entry-level jobs, a writing sample was included in the Training and Employment Prerequisites Survey, a multiple-choice test about skills like mechanics, usage, and spelling. The two writing prompts asked students to give directions for finding a location in a…