Describes a first-year composition sequence of assignments using the topic of family to allow students to write essays based on their own experiences. Notes that the sequence eventually requires that students also address connected ideas and then reflect on the convergence of the personal and analytical. (PRA)

Discusses ways to create a classroom environment that encourages students to test the power of their language through reading and writing experiences. Describes a writing lesson in a writer-centered classroom, what a writing classroom looks like, and what teachers should do first in terms of the physical setup of the classroom. (SR)

Maintains that magazine and journal articles can be a powerful marketing and education tool. Discusses planning an article, getting the most from the material, and working with editors. (SR)

Outlines several steps to follow to write exciting and lively news or feature stories. (SR)

Profiles writer and poet Barbara Juster Esbensen. Discusses her beginnings as a writer, writing and revising, work with children, and classroom uses of Esbensen's books. (SR)

Presents an extended analogy between different styles of gardening (neat, even rows of vegetables versus scattering of flowers) and different styles of writing (academic versus personal essay). Shows that genre boundaries are as questionable as gender boundaries and that all writing is a means of creating self, not for expressing a self that…

Presents the text of an account of the author's research. Notes that the text's four layers (scientific report, reflective analysis, personal history, and deliberative appeal) are each indispensable yet individually inadequate to the task. Considers the tensions among possible accounts of the research and what these tensions say about the reading…

Argues that rationality follows rhetoric and emerges from discourse. Asserts that teachers must empower the students by starting with honest personal writing and move to honest personal writing about public issues. Presents samples of students' writing which illustrate the problems involved in trying to sound rational when arguing personal points.…

Describes how a ninth grade teacher uses short, in-class writing conferences to help students with their writing process. Discusses the writing conferences of specific students and offers suggestions on planning, timing, and organizing the conferences. (PRA)

Examines writers' options in organizing comparisons. Finds that chunking of content in a systematic way is a strong predictor of holistic quality ratings, and that higher rated papers tend to be written by students with higher verbal abilities and more extensive topic knowledge. Demonstrates the complexity of the choices writers must make in…

Argues that, if rhetoricians are to make significant strides forward in understanding writing that takes place both within and external to a single workplace culture, they will need to develop a much more expansive, complex, and sophisticated vision of collaboration across multiple organizational cultures. (SR)

Presents an interview with Suzanne Fisher Staples, author of the children's novel, "Shabanu, Daughter of the Wind." Discusses Staples' creative writing process, background, and the writer's role as cultural observer. (HB)

Shares two examples of writing, both involving magic and incantation, used as models to help students add energy to their own writing. (MG)

Describes how writing oral history can help students to feel that they are participating in a lively intellectual and cultural process that travels beyond the limits of the classroom. Says students claim that their obligations to the assignment are surpassed by their feelings of gratification in having created living works with lasting vitality.…

Describes the genesis of three children's books to illustrate how the author borrows from the traditions of others to write her children's tales. (SR)