Teachers can help students realize that their own experiences provide good material for fascinating characters and stories, thus making narrative writing easier. One good way to help students recognize the power of daily events is to read to them from realistic children's literature. The article presents a model lesson. (SM)

Advocates the analysis of student writing and improvisations as texts offering images, stories, and information about their different backgrounds, languages, histories, and cultures. Outlines how teachers can develop strategies for generating such student writing, especially through the use of improvisation. (HB)

Describes the available video resources that might be used for preservice and inservice education on literacy issues. Presents an annotated bibliography of 14 videos or video series, all of which are designed for educators and center on teaching literacy. (HB)

Describes the Nebraska Literacy Project, a 5-week workshop for K-12 teachers modeled after the Nebraska Writing Project. Shows how teachers can encourage students to look closely at their own literacy histories and their daily practices as readers and writers. Presents the literacy histories as recorded by some participants. (HB)

Describes the way one teacher created in her English classroom an environment similar to a coffeehouse. Claims that using the coffeehouse model, a class meeting devoted to students reading aloud their own creative writing provided inspiration for the students to write. (HB)

Considers the effectiveness of using prose modeling in the composition classroom. Studies the differences in response between expert and novice writers who were asked to write essays in an unfamiliar form based on a prose model. Indicates that use of a prose model affects student response. (HB)

Reviews and analyzes the survey of doctoral programs in rhetoric and composition published in the same issue. Questions whether the field's new status in the academy is secure. Asks whether a valuable diversity of agendas and perspectives will be lost if the field keeps trying to "discipline" itself. (HB)

Claims that the field of rhetoric and composition is leading the way in the increase in attention to the preparation of graduate students as future teachers. Explains how composition programs encourage the development of teacherly attributes. Suggests priorities for further thought and research. (HB)

Reviews the scholarship on the connections between meditation and writing. Analyzes objections to the use of meditation in the writing classroom. Relates experiences using meditation techniques with various writing students. Suggests that writing teachers use meditation techniques with apprehensive or blocked writers. (HB)

Presents a transcript of the electronic discourse in response to Lester Faigley's recent book, "Fragments of Rationality," produced by a networked graduate seminar in composition studies. Discusses the impact of postmodernism on the composition classroom and the potential usefulness of similar networked attempts to write collaboratively.…

Considers the circumstances, the lack of preparation, and the plight experienced by English department teaching assistants. Examines one way of reforming the training regimen of teaching assistants that draws upon the ideas of reflection and reflective practice. Examines two ways of understanding reflection in terms of TA preparation. (HB)

Asserts that the literature on the use of writing in sociology ignores a systematic view of how writing relates to the discipline of sociology. Examines C. Wright Mills' concept of "sociological imagination." Provides suggestions for teachers who require student writing and seek to help student become better writers. (CFR)

Describes recent critical and theoretical works dealing with the topic of narrative and storytelling. Provides citations and brief annotations of 13 works. (HB)

Suggests that personal writing poses both opportunities and risks in writing classrooms. Discusses the experiences of two children in a fifth/sixth-grade writing process classroom. Notes that benefits of personal writing are opportunities for authenticity, finding voice, and a therapeutic value; whereas risks include coercion of students who are…

Claims that students from foreign countries tend to have little knowledge or background working with American research libraries. Describes a collaborative research project aimed at making academic libraries less intimidating for these students. Argues that such a method helps all students acquire essential skills. (HB)