One way to help the solitary student shape his or her ideas in writing is to arrange for the high school writing teacher to practice Peter Elbow's "believing game." This can be accomplished through a conference in which teachers bring drafts of some piece of writing they would like to work on. The heart of the conference begins as the teachers, working in small groups, introduce themselves and comment about some past writing experience. Each writer then takes a turn reading his or her writing aloud while the others in the small group listen. The goal is to share perceptions about the writing, not to decide that one response is better or more valid than another. Listeners tell the writer what went on in their heads as they listened, what associations they made with the writing, and what the writing reminded them of. At the next stage, each writer has three hours of solitude to contemplate his or her writing and to make revisions. Writers then have a choice of having their listeners respond again, using the same pattern of questions used earlier or asking for additional responses that relate to rhetorical considerations. Following this session, the conference ends with everyone coming together to share perceptions of the believing game and to explore some possible ways to use believing strategies in the classroom. It is expected that students whose teachers play the believing game with them during the exploratory stages of writing will, in the end, be more engaged with their writing and have a clearer understanding of the needs of the reader. (HOD)