An introductory two-semester education course for preservice elementary school teachers addresses in the first semester the topics of childhood, and how the family and society relate to teaching. In the second semester topics include children in the classroom, teaching philosophies, and professional issues. Student writing is used as a feedback method and as a cohesive technique for drawing classroom materials together. Students submit three to five journal entries a week, choosing to write on topics related to the main instructional goals for a particular period, recording observations of children, or writing about something of current interest in their own learning. Faculty avoid "corrective" comments on matters of style or form and respond only to content. Four definite educational advantages emerge from "expressive-writing oriented" journals. They allow: (1) faculty to assess and respond to genuine student learning; (2) students to express themselves candidly and assimilate and apply classroom materials to their own lives; (3) faculty to meet individual personality styles; and (4) faculty to assess "authentic" writing skills and plan for writing help to be given in another part of the course as well as throughout the students' programs. (JD)