Technical writing scholars have discussed, but not resolved, the ethical problems of ghost authorship (Should the technical editor have a place on the title page?) and multiple authorship (Can nine people really author an eight-page essay?). These ethical questions, however, are trivial when compared with the significantly more grave and…

One way to make it possible for students to write intelligible composition in a foreign language is to provide them with a knowledge and understanding of the bilingual dictionary at the beginning of the composition course. A unit on dictionary usage is presented that was designed for use with students in a third-year college Spanish composition…

With the advent of composition software, the microcomputer has become a valuable writing and teaching tool. In "Writing with a Word Processor" (Harper, 1983), William Zinsser details the trauma he experienced in the shift from being a pencil and paper writer to being a computer writer. However, those accustomed to composing at a typewriter will…

A review of over 1,000 student poems reveals the wide variety of forms taken by concrete poetry. Although not exhaustive, the list includes (1) figured verse, which uses poetry or poetic language to shape images; (2) letter/word images, created by the arrangement of letters of words in nonsentence form; (3) letter/word compounds, in which words…

During its two and one-half years of use, a computerized text editor has proven to be a helpful revision tool for a freshman composition course. Student feedback has helped to overcome initial problems with the system. A streamlined learner's guide, for example, that made formal training in using the computer unnecessary and increased student…

To determine the designs, procedures, and findings of studies related to an investigation of the developmental aspects of the writing processes of children, a literature search was made of documents indexed in "Current Index to Journals in Education" (CIJE) and "Resources in Education" (RIE). A search was also made of the literature in…

Microcomputer technology can assist students in two important phases of basic skills instruction--acquisition and application. Providing interactive practice with immediate feedback in a way that most students find motivating, microcomputers can help students build a solid foundation in such basic skills as punctuation use. In addition, word…

Teachers who restrict their teaching of writing to elements of exposition are likely to fail because there is insufficient content, interest, or challenge in learning simple exposition, and the techniques that contribute to polished exposition are more easily accessible when approached through aesthetic writing. A teaching sequence for using…

Responding to students' needs for systematic advice about their writing, a city university developed a voluntary test using student writing samples to evaluate punctuation and grammar, diction, sentence structure, and organization and development. Evaluation of 100 test results revealed that these students, all working adults, showed more control…

A study investigated the effect of writing on reading comprehension, vocabulary, and attitude of college freshmen enrolled in a reading course. Thirty-eight students were randomly assigned to either an experimental or a control group. Reading instruction varied only in the use of a writing component for the experimental group. Instruments used in…

A professional writing course can be both technical and humanistic by incorporating into the course a formal report assignment in which students pick a subject in the humanities about which they wish to know more. Once the students decide on topics to research, they develop a scenario in which they define a person or group who needs the…

A conscious understanding of the grammar system can have value for student writers. Unfortunately, the positive value of teaching grammar in an instrumental, or functional, way has been overshadowed by the negative and irrelevant data concerning "formal grammar." However, if teachers were to use "rhetorical grammar" and emphasize the importance of…

Word processing programs offer five capabilities that can help students over the physical and psychological constraints associated with writing. First, producing text on a word processor is more tentative and more noncommital than producing text on paper. This reassures the writer that it is all right to experiment with words. Second, the blinking…

Recent theoretical advances in text analysis and reading comprehension research are discussed and some implications for the related domain of textual interaction in composition in English as a second language (ESL) are suggested. The reading comprehension research reviewed is research from the perspective of written text as communicative…

The writing across the curriculum movement is discussed in six articles. Barbara Leigh Smith's introductory article, "Writing Across the Curriculum: What's at Stake?" reviews the rationale for this movement, including the declining emphasis on writing in high schools and colleges. In the "Winds of Change: Thomas Kuhn and the…