This paper reports the results and educational implications of an experimental, comparative study evaluating the gains in overall writing quality in two groups of college freshmen composition students. The experimental group of 45 students learned to compose their first four of eight essays on the computer, while their professor intervened with…

Identifies a number of the major aspects of social class that freshman composition addresses in its aims of enabling students to think and write in ways that will make them good citizens of the academic (and larger middle class) community and viable candidates for good middle class jobs upon graduation. (TB)

Offers a description of three prominent pedagogical approaches observed in freshman English teaching assistants (TAs): expressivism, formalism/mimeticism, and rhetoricism. Finds that, although a teacher may teach from all perspectives, usually one is emphasized. Studies and presents examples of each type. States that the rhetorical type is…

Compares Sophocles'"Antigone" with the shootings of antiwar protestors on May 4, 1970, at Kent State University to help ancient tragedy come alive for students as modern tragedy. (MG)

Suggests that using sociolinguistics as the subject of a semester-long course leads to real and exciting research rather than technically correct but lifeless "dummy runs" for real research in freshman composition courses. (MG)

Challenges the view of plagiarism as a moral rather than pedagogical issue and the view that students plagiarize when they know they are plagiarizing. Offers survey results indicating that students and instructors alike misunderstand plagiarism. Urges instructors to show students how to use secondary materials responsibly and to give students…

Describes a composition course in which students questioned their placement in remedial instruction based upon holistic evaluation of a single essay. Notes that, when students were assigned to judge the same essays, results correlated closely with the earlier evaluations. Suggests that the exercise made students more open to peer response and…

Argues that teachers must find new ways to integrate into the curriculum the critical thinking skills of writing, speaking, reading, and listening. Suggests placing students in problem-solving conferences which require participants to define, analyze, brainstorm on, and evaluate problems before finding and implementing solutions. Proposes…

Describes background and content of a library skills course paired with an English composition course in a developmental studies program for high risk university students. Several principles for teaching developmental students are listed, and suggestions for pairing courses are offered. (nine references) (MES)

Discusses the philosophical bases (cognitive and rhetorical) and the various institutional manifestations (freshman composition courses, adjunct and upper division courses, faculty seminars, and writing consultants) of writing across the curriculum. Argues that, at its best, writing across the curriculum means a change in the entire educational…

Examines the relationship between composition textbook authors and publishers. Discusses editors and publishers' concerns, and what authors need to know about textbook publishing. Focuses on ideology, economics, legalities, and the need for integrity and respect. Looks at the written contract, contractual brutality, legal counsel, contractual…

Emphasizes that composition teachers can create exercises fitted to the current psychological or process perspective on learning (freewriting, drafting, revision) by adding to classical or product perspective (copying, summarizing, paraphrasing, translating, amplifying) the elements of rhetorical purpose and sense of context and community. (RS)

Advocates using writing portfolios for reasons ranging beyond traditional assessment. Shows how using writing portfolio evaluation changes the way teachers think about their roles and the ways they view students and student writing. Analyzes data in terms of teachers' changes gathered from teaching assistants initiating a portfolio system. (HB)

Advocates making large-scale writing assessment consistent with the view that writing is fundamentally about making and sharing meaning. Argues that this is possible through a writing portfolio system of assessment. Describes how such a portfolio program was begun at the University of Michigan to assess beginning students. (HB)

Describes the problem of allowing students to voice their opinions in research papers. Argues that seeing this as a problem points to pedagogical problems. Shows how student hesitancy to engage their opinions reflects their own developing epistemology. (HB)