The author shows how using art helped a blind student in an AP class and students in Creative and Practical Writing classes improve writing proficiency and critical thinking.

In this article, the author describes how she used a commonplace book assignment to help students expand their background knowledge and as a means to formulate mature, informed perspectives regarding issues of importance. In the assignment, the author wanted the students to: (1) investigate issues of the day; (2) develop multiple perspectives…

Offers 10 classroom-tested assignments that result in successful writing experiences and assist students in developing creative and critical thinking skills. (RL)

Describes four essay assignments in a sequence on experts that deal with sharing expertise, defining expertise, interviewing an expert, and seeing teachers as experts. Asserts that these assignments result in writing that is no longer the recapitulation of information received from experts but is communication notable for the quality of its…

Describes how writing fiction helps students to write more effectively, think more critically, and enter difficult territory of complex issues. Illustrates how two students' stories led into discussions of meaning and values. (KEH)

Argues that bulk mailings can successfully be used in the classroom to teach reading, writing, and critical thinking skills. Provides examples of activities addressing salutations, alliteration, connotations, rhetorical appeals, sentence structures, close reading, and vocabulary development. (KEH)