Contends that prospective teachers' knowledge of what writing is and how it is taught is formed by their experiences as students. Describes a course that allows teachers transform their student experiences into appropriate teaching methods. Assesses how this curriculum was experienced by the teacher candidates. (DB)

Identifies research contributing to teachers' understanding not only of what it means to teach composition but how it might be implemented in a meaningful and productive manner to improve students' writing. Concludes that a variety of meaningful writing tasks contribute to student growth, writing instruction is a shared responsibility, and the…

Sets forth strategies intended to provide classroom teachers with some options that enhance writing for all students, but also provide special needs students with the structure they need to be successful as well. Describes the writing process, which includes prewriting activities, creating a draft, reviewing and revising, editing for polish,…

Second language writing scholars have undertaken descriptions of English-language writing instruction in a variety of international settings, describing the role of various contextual factors in shaping English-language writing instruction. This article describes English-language writing instruction at various levels in Poland, noting how it is…

Using a method of topical rhetorical analysis, inspired by K. Burke, to discuss the Ebonics debate, this article demonstrates that conversations about education, particularly writing instruction, have adopted a market rhetoric that limits teachers' agency. However, reappropriation of this market rhetoric can help writing teachers to imagine and…

Like most composition courses at large state universities, basic writing classes at the University of Minnesota are primarily taught by graduate teaching students. Graduate students and basic writers share a similar position in the university, sitting on the boundaries of the scholarly communities in which they eventually hope to participate. As…

Christopher Newport College, begun as a colony of the College of William and Mary, was born in the 1960s out of the fervor to open the doors of higher education to more people. It enrolls between 500-600 students in freshman writing courses each semester. Changes to the freshman composition program were undertaken, beginning in 1994, with a shift…

Those in composition studies know, experientially, that teaching informs their lives and results in knowledge, but they also know that English Studies culture(s) continue to valorize expert knowledge over community knowledge, empirical and scholarly research over alternate methods of constructing inquiry, and theory over practice. Although…

Just like their native-English-speaking peers, the many international students participating in United States higher education are subject to the institutional practices of composition studies. Those international students who are also English as a Second Language (ESL) students have special needs. In addition to the obvious grammar problems, many…

This collection of 10 essays argues that portfolios in the writing classroom are worth exploring and that such exploration opens up new opportunities: new ways to learn to write, to think about teaching writing, to understand students, teachers, and curricula, and to describe and report on what is found. The collection makes this argument by…

Nonnative English speaking students have usually felt intense pressure and loss of self-esteem in the typical English classroom in the United States. This is a direct result of America's longstanding distrust of foreigners, and the condescension with which the educational system has sometimes treated nonnative speakers. According to C. B. Stein,…

The Third College at the University of California, San Diego developed a peer observation program in which first-year composition instructors (mostly graduate teaching assistants) observe each other once per quarter. The peer observation program is not part of the process by which the writing program directors evaluate the instructors, but…

This project/study introduced the use of computers in one freshman composition course to determine whether the instructor and the students could accomplish more in a computer-based rather than a traditionally structured course. The assumption was that students would produce better essays on the word-processor and printer, and that the instructor…

As a student, a woman felt herself to be a "grammatically correct failure at writing." Having flunked high school junior English for failing to turn in a research paper on time, she later failed to learn as an undergraduate how to teach others to write. Though she was to teach a creative writing course for high school juniors and…

The mission of the National Writing Project (NWP) is to improve writing and learning in the nation's schools. Through its professional development mode, the National Writing Project recognizes the primary importance of teacher knowledge, expertise, and leadership. Through its extensive network of teachers, the National Writing Project seeks to…