A student's belief in the value of literacy is essential to effective teaching and successful learning, but can result only from a local culture whose aim is to produce literacy. The social identity and cultural norms of the young are registered in their use of language, and if literacy, as defined by others, calls the norms and identity into question, the gap between them and standard English will not be bridged. Teachers must understand that the contexts in which students revert to nonstandard English signal a disbelief in the value of literacy that interferes with the writing process. To generate a culture of literacy in the classroom that would stimulate a belief in the value of literacy, teachers should introduce materials that become the only context or experience from which the students write. Writing tasks could result from fragmenting or isolating a single literary work. Value placed on a piece of literature and its language creates a miniature culture of literacy. (HOD)