What happens when international doctoral students participate in a creative writing workshop? Very often, students at our large midwestern U.S. university enter classes having learned English in their native countries with a heavy emphasis on only skills and grammar. They have not had the chance to play with language, to express themselves through…

A study of the implementation of boy-friendly strategies for teaching writing was conducted in order to determine if the strategies would improve the writing achievement of fifth grade boys, thereby narrowing the gender achievement gap in writing. The strategies were categorized in four modalities: self-efficacy, perception/attitude, performance,…

This study examined how teachers design and implement instructional strategies to enhance students' emergent writing. A case study methodology was used to examine the elements of an emergent writing program of two kindergarten teachers. The study hoped to define a classroom environment that is conducive to literacy and writing using best…

A solution to the problem of preparing non-college ready students has been to offer developmental/remedial courses in community colleges. Studies have shown that students who begin and persist in these courses do just as well, if not better, than non-developmental education students. The majority of studies, however, have not examined the…

Linguists have long accepted the inevitability of linguistic variation as scientific fact. However, the general public continues to associate regional variation with low intelligence and to promote a non-regional, "accentless" English as the ideal. The result of this ideology, which ignores the natural diversity of all languages, is that…

In the next decade, community college English departments will expand their developmental course offerings. The students who take these developmental courses generally have higher incidence of diagnosed learning disabilities, bleak economic circumstances that require them to work full time, greater dependence on public transportation, and some…

A decade ago, the subtractive schooling of many Latino youth in the United States resulted in a devaluing of cultural identity and heritage as resources to support learning. Today, educators are urged to revalue cultural resources toward literacy development. This study explores the experiences of Latina adolescent students as writers during an…

This article is concerned pragmatically with how recent research findings in assessment for learning (AfL) can bring about higher quality learning in the day-to-day classroom. The first half of this paper reviews recent studies within Black and Wiliam's (2009) framework of formative assessment and looks for insights on how pedagogical procedures…

"Voices of Pedagogical Development" is a collection of articles written by teacher-researchers at the University of Jyväskylä Language Centre. It shares the fruits of their ideas and development work in the areas of academic literacies, new forms of teaching and learning, and internationalisation. Part one aims at establishing and…

The practical writing course aims at helping students have a comprehensive understanding of writing subjects and improve their abilities of analyzing and understanding texts. This paper has explored how writing textbooks are used in the writing course and pointed out that the aim should be to help students improve their ability of analysis and…

James Moffett is revered by many for his contributions to English education, but his interest in discourse and rhetoric led him beyond reform in the language arts curriculum to a vision of a radically reconceived approach to education, one in which disciplinary knowledge is subordinate to the processes of symbolic representation that creates that…

The author explores the place of feminism in teaching through the lens of rhetorical dexterity, providing a case study.

For many students the first-year composition (FYC) classroom marks the beginning of college. The FYC instructor acts as a leader and a mentor for each student who is unique and approaches learning differently. The question is whether students enter the classroom prepared for the challenge of academic writing with a high sense of self-efficacy and…

In cities across the nation, communities of color find themselves resisting state disinvestment and the politics of dispossession. Students at the Center--a writing initiative based in several New Orleans high schools--takes on this struggle through a close examination of race and schools. The book builds on the powerful stories of marginalized…

Background: The need for improvement in writing instruction in schools is dependent on teachers being aware of evidence-based procedures in writing and implementing them on a regular basis in their classrooms. Purpose: The purpose of this study was to explore the frequency with which teachers in Western Canada employed evidence-based procedures in…