It is inevitable that learners make mistakes in the process of learning a foreign language. Despite this fact, what is questioned by language teachers is why students go on making the same mistakes even when such mistakes have been repeatedly pointed out to them. Yet, not all mistakes are the same and sometimes they seem deeply ingrained, but at…

This paper aims to examine how to promote university students' engagement in learning by means of instructor-initiated EFL writing groups. The research took place in Rwanda and was undertaken as a case study involving 34 second year undergraduate students, divided into 12 small working groups and one instructor. The data were collected by means of…

This "Voices from the Field" paper presents methods and participant-exemplar data for integrating digital video cameras into the writing process across postsecondary literacy contexts. The methods and participant data are part of an ongoing action-based research project systematically designed to bring research and theory into practice…

English 341: Advanced Composition for Teachers is a three-credit undergraduate course for pre-service educators at Francis Marion University, a mid-size public university located in northeast South Carolina. According to the university catalog, students enrolled in English 341 "explore connections among writing, teaching, and learning as they…

Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to explore the use of the prototype of a mobile application for the enhancement of children's motivation for writing. The results are explored from students' and experts' perspectives. Design/methodology/approach: This study is based on a field trial and expert evaluations of a prototype of a mobile…

It has been debated whether teachers should treat students' grammatical errors in second language writing instruction (Truscott, 1996, 1999, 2010; Ferris, 1999, 2004, 2010). Several meta-analyses have investigated correction effects (e.g. Russell & Spada, 2006; Truscott, 2007). Their findings, however, have been conflicting. A recent trend to…

In this article, I describe my reflections on developing student authors through a class research project. I review the assignment origins and description and my role in the students' developmental journey from transforming a class assignment to a publishable work. (Contains 1 figure.)

The use of personal, reflective writing exercises is well documented in the disciplines of composition and management, and each discipline has been highly influential in establishing pedagogical practices in the business communication classroom. However, we see little evidence of the pedagogical practice, the use of personal reflective writing…

In this column, Kenji Hakuta and Mario Santos described the challenges and opportunities the Common Core State Standards and the Next Generation Science Standards present for language development in the context of English language arts/literacy, mathematics, and science. They heightened educators' awareness of the critical role language plays…

Students with emotional and behavioral disorders (E/BD) have academic deficits that affect their success in school; however, few researchers have investigated what strategies work best for this population, especially in the area of writing. One promising intervention to support the writing skills of students with and at-risk for E/BD is…

This study explores the use of online writing studios housed in the University Writing Center and attached to a Writing in the Disciplines course in the College of Technology and a First Year Composition program. The original goal of the online writing studio, modified from Grego and Thompson's (2009) writing studio approach, was to create an…

This paper will examine the collaborative teaching process undertaken at College of the North Atlantic-Qatar (CNA-Q) by Engineering and the Communication faculties to improve the overall quality of engineering students' capstone projects known as the Technical Thesis. The Technical Thesis is divided into two separate components: a proposal stage…

The "High School Puente Program" aims to help disadvantaged students graduate from high school, become college eligible, and enroll in four-year colleges and universities. Interdisciplinary in approach, the program has three components: writing, counseling, and mentoring. Students in the ninth and tenth grades receive rigorous writing…

In an effort to increase writing scores and improve knowledge about historical events, a school district in the western region of the United States trained several teachers through the Document Based Question (DBQ) program. The rationale for this study was to explore the perceptions of elementary teachers who participated in this training in order…

In this study, I argue that those in the field of composition need to reclaim the important work of graduate student writing teachers and the introductory courses they teach. By conducting this feminist poststructural case study, I sought to add to current conversations about teacher knowledge and professional learning by affording graduate…