Argues for using the metaphor of the contract as a principal strategy for teaching students how to craft introductions. (SR)

Surveys more than 100 "authorities"--writing researchers or officials of the National Writing Project--to determine what they believe teachers should be doing in the writing classroom. (FL)

Criticizes the focus among some educators upon the writing process. Notes that all writers do not follow the same process and that teaching students otherwise oversimplifies writing instruction and diminishes efforts to improve it. Explains a "scaffolding" approach which involves outlining of increments in a writing process without…

Discusses the ways in which a high school basic writing teacher abandoned the advice about her students offered by her colleagues and chose instead to develop a student-centered writing workshop. Demonstrates the potential a workshop model has for creating a community of authors in a high school basic writing class. (RS)

Suggests that error analysis can be manageable for teachers and instructive for basic writers. Explains five critical principles of error analysis in basic writing: understand students' intentions; set consistent priorities; analyze for clarification of intentions; encourage students to set their own goals; and help students objectify their…

Examines the long-term effects of the 1980 Virginia Tech Faculty Writing Workshop, a writing across the curriculum workshop that trained teachers from a variety of disciplines to use writing as a means of teaching their disciplines. Shows writing across the curriculum programs work, but that teaching through writing does require increased time and…