The collaborative student essay invites exploration of various points of view in multiple voices. The co-written essay brings out language's heteroglossic richness, as shown by the students' collaborative writing experiences in a college writing class. Students worked within the frames of two assignments: (1) an analysis of a text or trend; and…

David Bartholomae and Anthony Petrovsky's book "Ways of Reading" creates a paradox for readers, for a primary thesis of the book is that there should be no standard or traditional readings to which a new reader must conform. A successful reader will interrogate and dispute the text at every turn. The book's organization mirrors the…

By engaging in philosophical discussion in their writing, freshman composition students can discover that writing is a mediating tool between the self and the objective world, a means to examine the nature of reality and their thinking processes. Introducing philosophical issues opens the door for the investigation of difficult and abstract topics…

For one of a series of related assignments, students were to ride a Chicago Transit Authority (CTA) bus or commuter train through the heart of Chicago, to experience the contrasts among the people there, and to write about what was learned. The students were to take an analytical view: What does this collection of images tell the student about the…

The grading standard of the Language Skills Center at the State University of New York (Geneseo) has been adapted from the Diederich-French-Carlton Composition Scale and is designed so that instructors may respond objectively to student writing in six important areas: ideas; organization; vocabulary; sentence structure; punctuation; and…

Using Barry Kroll's distinction of the three perspectives of audience dominant in the field of composition, this paper presents methods for teaching audience awareness in freshman composition. The theories underlying the rhetorical, informational, and social perspectives of audience are discussed; and the methods typical of each perspective are…

In order to have freshman composition students review and strengthen their research and documentation skills, they are asked to write 700 to 1,000-word papers synthesizing from sources such as anthologies, journals, government documents, films, biographies, almanacs, and interviews. Three assignments require the students to gather information…

A research project surveyed 97 students enrolled in Composition 101 at the University of Illinois, Chicago, in an effort to determine what goes on in the mind of a student faced with three choices of argument topics. The hypothesis was that Topic C--profanity--would be chosen most often and that the reasons cited would be "universality,"…

A program evaluation was undertaken at Southern Illinois University (Carbondale) to assess the broad, measurable effects of using computers to teach introductory college composition. Twenty-four classes were studied--twelve control classes and twelve experimental--with the experimental computer classes meeting in the lab for half of their…

A case study examined the student-teacher relationship in writing conferences to determine how both teachers and students can better negotiate teaching-learning situations. Students enrolled in a six-week tutorial writing course at the University of Michigan were used as subjects. Tape-recorded conversations in the weekly half-hour conferences…

Presents the composition program policy statement of the Indiana University-Purdue University at Fort Wayne. Discusses the following topics: (1) the goal of freshman writing courses; (2) rhetorical awareness and context; (3) the writing process; (4) areas often overemphasized; (5) writing assignments; and (6) evaluating student writing. (JG)

Traces 25 years of freshman composition courses, highlighting "the expulsion of literature from the Garden of Composition,""the diluting of intellectual expectations and of the principles upon which programs were established," today's better management and writing teachers, and personal changes in instruction. Offers reflections on the future of…

Claims that two primary and mostly unacknowledged theories dominate writing textbooks: (1) a truncated version of the five classical canons, and (2) the modes of discourse--exposition, description, narration, and argumentation. (SKC)

Argues that C. H. Knoblauch and Lil Brannon's "Rhetorical Traditions and the Teaching of Writing" misrepresents and misunderstands the benefits of classical rhetoric to composition and that writing instructors who oppose the use of principles of ancient rhetoric must re-assess the value of classical rhetoric today. (SKC)

Evaluates the freshman composition course for students with low standardized test scores at Eastern Illinois University. Finds that the course has been moderately successful in achieving its aim of giving underprepared students a chance of success in college. (SKC)