This paper explores the importance of peer relations for the experiences and texts of children in a third-grade writing workshop. Peers, as an audience for children's writing, bring with them friendship, trust, and a "social energy" that empowers authors and their writing in the classroom. Simultaneously, peers also bring with them…

The Northeast Texas Workplace Partnership Program developed curriculum and training materials based on the literacy requirements of the workplace for two different industries in northeast Texas--Lone Star Steel Company and Pilgrim's Pride Industries. Three advisory committees were established to involve the community, education, and business and…

Intended to suggest ways of implementing the potential of NovaNet beyond its current applications, this report begins with an overview of current educational applications of telecommunications systems. It is noted that NovaNET is not only a successful computer system for presenting instructional courseware, but that it also supports…

A study investigated the effectiveness of an adapted Writing to Read (WTR) program that focused on the writing process and included the "Stories and More" software for literature-based emphasis. Over 1000 writing portfolio samples were collected from kindergarten through second grade students in 29 classrooms in 6 California school…

Based on years of classroom observation, this book presents the thesis that powerful, critical, active, productive literacy can be achieved systematically, and regularly, with large numbers of the school population, if the principles currently known as the whole language approach are applied. The book is based on the assumptions that learning to…

This resource guide is designed to provide foreign language teachers with suggestions for helping students learn how to become better language learners. The five chapters of the guide for teaching writing skills are as follows: (1) Teaching Learning Strategies (e.g., rationale for teaching, types, useful strategies, guidelines, instructional…

This document consists of the three 1990 issues and the two 1991 issues of a journal that publishes articles on the education of Hawaii's children. The journal covers such topics as teaching strategies, instructional settings, and cultural differences. Articles in the January 1990 issue consider: (1) reading and literacy in the Kamehameha…

A case study of the responses of two faculty members to a seminar designed to help them use writing-across-the-curriculum in their classrooms was undertaken. The purpose of the seminar was to examine the positive and negative views of the concept of "resistance" to illuminate reasons for, and forms of, faculty resistance to change. The…

Just as student centered, collaborative classrooms give students the power to direct their own learning, so too a collaborative, partnership model for the writing staff leads to empowerment and professionalism. At Western Illinois University, involving temporary instructors in the process of curriculum development not only served to boost their…

The Language and Literacy Block is an attempt to improve the preparation of elementary teachers to teach literacy. It is a component of a year-long preservice teacher education program that is a collaborative enterprise between the University of Illinois and a local school district. Some key features of the Language and Literacy Block include: (1)…

Originally developed as part of a project for the Department of Defense Schools (DoDDS) system, this learning package on ways to evaluate writing is designed for teachers who wish to upgrade or expand their teaching skills on their own. The package includes an overview of the project; a comprehensive search of the ERIC database; a lecture giving…

Inservice training programs on the needs of English as a second language (ESL) students may help writing lab staffs work more effectively. The training program could be a series of sessions devoted to six areas of concern: bridging the culture gap; profiling students' strengths and weaknesses; identifying error patterns on which to work in the…

There are compelling reasons to use talk in the writing classroom to improve both expressive and expository writing. First, speaking is natural, and students come to the writing classroom linguistically well-developed and confident. Second, talking encourages exploration of words by slowing down the thought process without completely stopping it.…

Designed to alleviate the confusion caused by the existence of a multiplicity of approaches to writing research, the four parts of this book present explicit discussions of research principles and methods used by researchers actively working within a variety of disciplines. The two chapters in Part 1 describe very broad views of the entire…

The home's supportive setting, which has the potential to encourage children to share their thoughts and feelings through spoken language, is the basis of the home's strength as a communicative context. Teachers can help extend this sharing of meaning by creating classroom environments in which written language experiences and microcomputer-based…