Supporting Strategic Writers (SSW) is an instructional approach and curriculum for college developmental English and integrated reading and writing courses. SSW is based on strategy instruction integrated with practices common in college English. Students learn strategies for writing and critical reading of sources based on rhetorical analysis and…

Current composition practice relies on a decades-old summary of research concluding that a focus on grammar in students' writing is useless, or even harmful. Conversely, hundreds of recent studies from the fields of second-language writing and applied linguistics claim to provide evidence of the benefits to providing feedback on grammar in…

With changes to placement testing and many students being able to self-place into college-level courses, first-year community college students are often entering English composition classes without a strong academic skillset. Tutoring can be a way to support students, but many do not attend tutoring. At a rural community college, students in two…

The study reported used a Community of Practice (CoP) framework to implement a content-based peer feedback intervention. The goal of this work was to investigate the contribution of the peer feedback intervention influence on improving the writing skills of forty-six community college students in four classes; three classes received the peer…

Community college students often struggle with writing tasks, and the skills used in summary writing are especially challenging for many of them (see Brown & Day, 1983; Day, 1980, 1986; Friend, 2001; Perin, 2002). Modeling has been demonstrated to be an effective tool for teaching a variety of writing skills to elementary and secondary pupils…

The article presents the results of a randomized experimental study of a writing curriculum for college developmental writing courses based on strategy instruction with self-regulation integrated with practices common in college composition. Students in a full semester course learned strategies for planning and revising based on rhetorical…

This study, positioned within a Community of Practice (CoP) theoretical framework, examined the way in which a content-based peer feedback writing intervention contributed to community college students' feelings of belongingness. Participants engaged in either a content-based peer feedback writing intervention or a teacher-guided self-edit.…

The present study was designed to test a group-based format of dynamic assessment (G-DA) in the context of writing over a time span of twelve weeks of instruction. A cohort of 60 students took a homogeneity test and based on the results, 44 students were selected to participate forming the two groups of experimental (N = 22) and control (N = 22).…

A convergent mixed methods research design addressed the extent of benefit obtained from reading culturally inclusive prompts (i.e., four brief essays written by Latino authors) to improve essay writing in a developmental (pre-collegiate) English course. Participants were 45 Latino students who provided quantitative data. Chi square analysis…

With technology on the rise not only within society but also within higher education, it is essential for community college students to become fluent in digital literacy as well as social media. This project supported community college students' use of social media and Pecha Kucha to develop their critical thinking skills and improve their writing.

This quasiexperimental investigation describes the relative effects of a technology-driven course redesign on retention and achievement in a developmental writing program at a large, urban community college in the southwest United States. The new program focused on student learning and included online as well as face-to-face components that…

This study examined the effectiveness of the ANSWER Strategy (Hughes, Schumaker, & Deshler, 2005) in improving the essay composition skills of post-secondary students with developmental disabilities. The six-step strategy incorporated analyzing essay prompts, creating an outline, generating an essay response, and reviewing the answer. The…

This study investigates the relationships between individual learner characteristics and gain in writing performance as measured by a standardized writing assessment in a sample of community college academic English as a Second Language (ESL) students in the United States. The ethnically and linguistically diverse convenience sample included 76…

The purpose of this study was to examine the intersection between and among creativity, cognition, composition, and community. Researchers studied hundreds of adult students from several California community colleges and private universities by means of surveys, observations, and interviews to augment an extensive historical literature review.…

Today, and historically, the presence of WAC/WID programs in the community college setting remains anemic when compared to Ph.D.-granting institutions. This fact is particularly troubling considering the AAC&U's research on high-impact practices and its correlation with WAC/WID theory and practice. This article empirically investigates the…