International studies of talk-intensive (or 'dialogic') pedagogies have demonstrated that children who experience academically challenging classroom discussion ('dialogue') make greater progress than their peers who have not had this experience. In England, gains in achievement have been greatest for pupils from less privileged socio-economic…

The present research examined the extent to which the initial approach to a research-writing course by STEM and non-STEM second-language learners may entail the contribution of different dispositions to course performance and ultimately be responsible for dissimilar outcomes. Individual differences in dispositions and behavior were assessed during…

Writing proper English sentences poses a significant challenge for Arabic-speaking postsecondary students studying English as a Foreign Language (EFL) due to substantial differences between Arabic and English syntactic structures. This basic qualitative study explored the perceptions of Arabic-speaking EFL learners at an Arabian university…

This article reports on the partial results of a longitudinal study I conducted to investigate the first-year students' experiences in dealing with the challenges they face while attaining the academic literacy skills required of them and constructing their academic identities at an American university in the UAE. While the challenges encountered…

First-year courses prepare students for the transition to, and success in, college. Institutions are interested in assessing student learning outcomes to achieve institutional goals and maintain accreditation. Though it may be difficult to measure student learning and success, colleges aim to assess student learning in the classroom by setting…

The practice of including online discussion posts to traditional courses is increasing. Online discussions allow for active learning to occur as students express their ideas and respond to others. The time and thought provided by online discussion posts allows students to utilize higher level cognitive skills. Web-based assessments are another…

The purpose of the study is to determine the effects of using writing activities with different learning purposes by the secondary school 7th grade students on their academic achievement and attitudes towards the course. The study was carried out in a secondary school located in the centre of Erzurum in 2012-2013 academic year; the study is a…

Experimental research has demonstrated both the deleterious effects of negative stereotypes about ability on academic performance and the relative ease with which stereotypes can be countered in educational settings. The extent to which stereotypes contribute to the achievement gap between American students from dominant social and economic groups…

The primary objective of this dissertation was to help illuminate why most students who enroll in developmental English at community colleges never make it to a college-level course. The extant literature suggests that students' learning experiences in a course largely account for success or failure, yet few studies have uncovered how students…

"Invisible Girls" is an examination of twenty-four at-risk adolescent girls' writing practices in a Third Space setting located within a school but outside of the confines of a regular classroom. Through a description of the girls' writing over a three-and-a-half-year period in this setting, Mellinee Lesley details phenomena that both support and…

We assessed the benefits of employing microthemes--short in-class writing assignments designed to facilitate active learning--as pedagogical tools in psychology courses. Students in target course sections completed 10 in-class microthemes during a semester. We designed the microthemes to serve as active learning assignments that would enhance…

Since the early 1970s, many educators have touted writing as a means of enhancing learning. Several reasons have been suggested for this purported enhancement: that writing is a form of learning, that writing approximates human speech, that writing supports learning strategies. Alternatively, some researchers have cautioned that the educative…

This paper presents an easy and free online tool that has visually enhanced teachers' writing-response pedagogy and helped their students comprehend their composing. Create a Graph is a free and intuitive online data-graphing program developed by the National Center for Education Statistics. In three clicks a visual depiction of weaknesses or…

The major objective of this study was to determine the effect on academic performance of the 12th year English background of students in college freshman composition. Student survey forms were given to 415 students enrolled in their first college English course in order to assess their past writing experiences, and questionnaires were sent to…

A single-class method to help students clarify their thinking so they can identify quality work is presented. Unless students are familar with the criteria being applied to their work, their assignment work is unlikely to show improvement. (MLW)