This article outlines four different views of ELA's economic mission. It also presents a classroom activity in which students (a) evaluate the four views and (b) advocate for their own ideas about ELA and economics.

Offers two views supporting the concept of tracking and another telling how one middle school teacher works around tracking. (MG)

Describes 12 successful mini-courses which use newspapers as the basic skills text. (DD)

Satirizes the teaching of basic skills in isolation and the placing of test results above true learning. (RL)

Argues that the five-paragraph-essay structure is a valuable teaching tool but cautions that composition teachers need to ensure that their students don't perceive it as an end in itself. Illustrates how students can learn the principles of effective composition and apply them to any writing task by making necessary modifications. (KEH)

Argues that effective grammar instruction depends on shifting from a teacher's to a learner's grammar. Introduces techniques for presenting grammar that are accurate, workable, economical, compact, operational, and immediate. (MM)

Relates how a high school English teacher reorganized the "basic skills" course to reflect greater attention not to isolated skills and drill but to meaningful practice in reading, writing, speaking, and listening. Focuses on the technique of a "Reading Blitz"--five successive days of reading--to develop other language activities. (RL)

Traces the roots of composition instruction to the nineteenth century and shows the origins of many current traditions in writing, as well as describing the first "crisis" in basic skills, which took place in about 1870. (DD)

A teacher notes the good and bad effects of the "back to basics" movement. (RL)

Shows how troubled students who usually act tough and indifferent open up and become interested in learning and willing to show their weaknesses in an in-school suspension environment. Argues that such students need increased skills and a safe environment, movement toward creativity and compassion, and movement away from thoughts of survival. (TB)

Uses complaints leveled against English teachers in l912 to support three points about the crisis in literacy: (1) the "writing crisis" is not new, (2) teaching basics will not solve crisis, and (3) solution to problem should be based on what is known about history and theory of composition instruction and about successful and unsuccessful methods…

Describes a three-week unit with disadvantaged students in an alternative school called "Outsiders: Literature and Life," which focused on experiences of alienation, involved reading "The Outsiders" by S. E. Hinton, and culminated in the production of a magazine of student-written oral histories. (EL)

Presents a model for working with students at risk, helping them develop critical thinking, listening, reading, and writing skills. Includes cooperation of the local community relations officer for the police department. (RAE)