Describes a unit for a basic writing course using broadcast journalism to strengthen students' critical thinking skills and improve their writing facility. (MM)

Illustrates how riddles can be used to teach poetry. Provides analysis of several riddles and resources for riddles. (MS)

Details a lesson which facilitates the transition from writing narrative prose to writing more difficult expository structures by engaging students in writing a research report on a fantasy animal they create. (MM)

Outlines a series of progressive exercises designed to train students in written persuasive discourse in French. The technique involves observation of advertising, study of premises, arguments, and conclusions, pragmatic text analysis, training in logical construction, and development of argumentative strategies. (MSE)

Traces the writing problems of visual thinkers to three factors: a lack of words, the unimportance of sequence, and the presumption of context. Pleads for better understanding of the thinking processes that produce such writing problems and the development of new ways of teaching writing that directly address visual thinkers. (SR)

Describes a writing assignment through which students build an understanding of perspectives other than their own. Shows how students, using dice, can create the outlines of a character and, having thought about this character, can write a paper from that character's perspective. (TB)

Makes a case for using legal decisions as written by courtroom judges as a basis for introducing undergraduate students to the principles of rhetoric. Shows how an examination of a number of cases concerning the public sleeping rights of homeless people raises issues concerning audience, argument, and effect. (TB)

Demonstrates how fairly distinctive and long-standing writing center philosophy and practice are reflected in the portfolio method of assessment. Argues that the immediate value of demonstrating a consistency between writing center philosophy and portfolio assessment is that clues for refining and improving the use of portfolios lie in writing…

Provides reflections on the work of four writing teachers in a neighborhood adult literacy center to understand better the potential "violence" of literacy learning, to reassess assumptions of expressivist pedagogy, and to turn to M. Bakhtin and M. Foucault as interpretive frames for theorizing adult literacy learning. Proposes…

This study examined whether sentence-combining exercises (with reinforcement) would increase the number of descriptive adjectives used in daily writing samples by three adolescents with autism. The sentence-combining exercises increased the number of adjectives used in the students' writing samples, and this increase was maintained in the absence…

This article discusses methods for teaching students to improve the introductory paragraphs of their papers and essays. The use of specific concrete images, interesting contrasts and facts, and illustrative metaphors to grab the reader's attention is explored, and examples of students' writing and brainstorming processes are provided. (PB)

Argues that writing models, such as the inverted pyramid, help students of news writing reach more quickly the point at which many of their skills become automatic. Describes the "news in four paragraphs" model for hard news stories, and discusses the limits of models. (SR)

Suggests that the key to making research writing something students are eager to learn is the instructor's enthusiasm and skill in gathering irresistible ideas and prompts to pique students' curiosity. Presents seven steps to help students write research papers. (RS)

Reviews two reports by National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP): (1) Listening to Children Read Aloud: Data from NAEP's Integrated Reading Performance Record (IRPR) at Grade 4 (oral reading and factors associated with reading fluency); and (2) Windows into the Classroom: NAEP's 1992 Writing Portfolio Study (types of writing and quality…

Reprints a 1989 article from this journal describing what happened when students who could not read and write like other kids were turned loose in a computer lab. Updates the article with an Afterword commenting on the earlier piece. (SR)