This study examined the impact of letter grading on student attitudes toward composition in freshman English. One treatment group received letter grades on twelve compositions written during the course of the study and the other group received no letter grades. Both groups were treated identically in all other ways, including the use of positive…

Reconstructionism is an extension and elaboration of the progressivist philosophy of education developed by John Dewey and his intellectual associates. Thomas Brameld also views reconstructionism as the beginning of a new philosphy of education, and this dissertation develops an approach to teaching literature that functions with Brameld's views.…

The purpose of this study was to design a competency-based curriculum for an English major in a liberal arts college. Questionnaires were mailed to 248 English majors graduating from public and private liberal arts colleges during the 1968-73 period. The questionnaire was made up of cognitive learning and affective learning categories following…

This study is concerned with the concept of rhetorical stance: the interrelationships among speaker, content, and audience in a communication situation. It is hypothesized that when the rhetorical stance model is applied to the secondary English curriculum, the teaching of literature will improve. This hypothesis is confirmed by evidence gained in…

The purpose of this study was to determine how much emphasis is placed on minority literature in the American literature course in the secondary schools of South Carolina. A questionnaire dealing with various aspects of the American literature course was sent to the chairmen of English departments in 216 secondary schools, and the findings are…

This investigation examines the historical influences on the New Theatre in terms of a figural tradition and suggests that the New English may also be analyzed in terms of a figural tradition. In part 1, a new theory of the "historical figura" is proposed. The first chapter describes the origins of the "human figura" in…

To determine the effects of a permissive, nonpunitive learning climate on the affective and cognitive learning of black freshmen English students, 30 black freshmen English students were grouped heterogeneously in a writing laboroatory at Hampton Institute during the 1971-72 academic year. Three hypotheses were tested: (1) communication is a…

Fifteen inner-city senior English classes in a New York City high school participated in this study of the effect of behavioral objectives on achievement in English sentence skills. Students were pretested with a measure of tolerance of ambiguity and a test consisting of correct sentences, sentence fragments, and run-on sentences. Teachers then…

The effectiveness of a system of supervision of classroom teaching, involving the videotaping of instruction and an objective evaluation instrument, was investigated using eight veteran English teachers. The system was designed to correct weaknesses in supervision, based on classroom observation, conferences, and reports on the observations and…

Sixty students in four sections of freshman composition participated in a study comparing written corrections of student themes with oral, individualized evaluations in which the instructor explained problems and weaknesses in each theme and helped the student improve the writing. There were no other differences in the activities of the control…

This study focused upon the reading interests, habits, and attitudes of high school junior English students. A survey instrument was used to collect data concerning differences among groups of students (sex, race, and academic placement) in terms of preferred reading materials and areas of interest, specific reading interests, actual reading…

In order to determine if multiple choice spelling tests are as effective as handwritten tests, 265 college freshmen were tested on the same spelling words by traditional oral dictation and then by five-option multiple choice questions. Results were compared to examine the efficacy of multiple choice testing. Of a possible 20 points, the mean score…

The study investigated the effectiveness of a flexible modular system for teaching composition. It was hypothesized that measures of compositional ability would significantly favor students in the experimental course, and students in the experimental course would register significantly higher in affective measures of interest and involvement. The…

In this study, a comparison was made between the achievement scores in English usage of students who were assigned English classes during their last two years of high school and the scores of students who elected English classes. The 667 participants in this study were members of the 1970 and 1972 graduating classes at Aviation High School,…

A review of research and literature in the teaching of writing suggests two divergent forces operating simultaneously. First, the conservative tradition perpetuates the national mania for correctness and reverence for standard English. Second, a wide range of theoretical approaches proliferates through professional journal articles and books. To…