Whole Language has become a visible and strong movement in language instruction. Yet there is still considerable disagreement as to what Whole Language entails and there are different degrees of knowledge held by various self-professed Whole Language teachers. Some are at a beginning stage of knowledge regarding Whole Language as philosophy and…

This booklet documents the first 5 years of the Alaska State Writing Consortium, an association made up of 45 Alaska school districts, the Alaska Department of Education, and the University of Alaska. The Consortium, which oversees the organization and implementation of teacher training programs in writing and the teaching of writing, has five…

This short pamphlet promotes the Newspaper in Education (NIE) program. The pamphlet discusses reasons why educators should choose newspapers as instructional tools; how newspapers can be used for indivdualized instruction, reading, writing, computing, and critical thinking; what the research says about the use of newspapers in schools; what…

Recent use of the "New Yorker" Education Program in an upper division non-fiction writing class in the School of Journalism of the University of Tennessee proved to be very effective. Initially, the numerous assignments to read detailed articles appeared overwhelming to the students, but they soon learned the importance of reading as the…

The peer-group method of composition instruction represents the quintessence of the "environmental" mode of teaching which brings teacher, student, and materials more nearly into balance. Responding to recent criticisms of peer-response groups, a model was developed to establish a middle course, balancing (1) philosophical stances; (2)…

An annotated bibliography of articles, dissertations, papers, and books written since 1983 on the teaching of composition to students of English-as-a-Second-Language contains 84 citations. The list includes ERIC document numbers and Dissertation Abstracts numbers. (MSE)

"Purpose" is an important term in rhetorical theory and writing pedagogy. An analysis of the presentation of "purpose" in three well-regarded, theory-based textbooks ("Writing in the Liberal Arts Tradition: A Rhetoric with Readings,""Writing with a Purpose," and "Form and Surprise in Composition")…

Assessing the current state of writing instruction for the business world as well as promising developments of theory and practice in this expanding field, this book contains 14 articles by nationally known leaders in this teaching specialty. The first section of the book, looking at the writing process as it applies to professional writing,…

If lesbian and gay students are to be moved into the classroom writing communities consciously and aggressively, in the same way other "minorities" are included, then first-person narratives are an effective starting place for their own work and as material for reading and discussion. Half of the reading selections in one composition…

The ability to function independently as a reader and writer in the society is defined here as "functional literacy" and includes, for gay or lesbian students, access to their own cultural literature and the recognition of a multi-cultural literacy that includes gay and lesbian culture. Two central beliefs are at the heart of the…

Intended to provide teachers with a variety of holistic activities to promote thinking skills and the synthesis of skills while also raising scores on the Texas Educational Assessment of Minimal Skills (TEAMS), this booklet focuses on activities which teachers can implement immediately. The publication contains major sections for each of the…

This how-to guide gives clear, helpful, specific advice on every step of the oral history process: using the tape recorder; conducting the interview; transcribing the interview; editing the transcript; writing short pieces; writing full biography; writing from multiple narratives; and publishing the results. It also includes an invaluable…

The University of Southwestern Louisiana offers an English major in technical writing. Many assignments and topics are covered in the junior technical writing course, but one of the most effective projects combines the students' and the professor's expertise and focuses on writing for a specific audience. The technical writer's job is to know how…

Discussing available computer software for prompting for the kinds of computers likely to be used in writing programs, this paper concentrates on categorizing software programs and exploring their "uniquely electronic" features. The paper deals with the following questions: (1) What kinds of planning software are available? (2) What happens when…

Noting that recent issues of several scholarly journals have contained criticism of protocol analysis and the use of verbal reports in the analysis of the writing process, this paper examines some of the charges made and then explores the implications of the criticisms. Specific charges addressed in the paper include the following: (1) protocols…