Given the current emphasis on disciplinary discourses, it's not surprising that so little recent attention has been devoted to identifying conventions that are universal in academic discourse. In this essay, the author argues that there are shared features that unite academic writing, and that by introducing these features to first-year students…

One of the best opportunities that undergraduates have to learn to write like a scientist is to write a thesis after participating in faculty-mentored undergraduate research. But developing writing skills doesn't happen automatically, and there are significant challenges associated with offering writing courses and with individualized mentoring.…

This article presents the rationale for and implementation of the family message journal as a writing tool. The family message journal provides multiple opportunities for students to develop as writers while strengthening the school-home connection. This article provides examples of rhetorical moves that indicate young writers are aware of their…

The author explores the place of feminism in teaching through the lens of rhetorical dexterity, providing a case study.

Previous studies on the effect of planning on language production have revealed that planning does have a positive effect on language performance in terms of fluency, complexity, and accuracy. The present study was an attempt to investigate the effects of pre-task, on-line, and both pre-task and on-line planning on fluency, accuracy, and…

This study examined how teachers design and implement instructional strategies to enhance students' emergent writing. A case study methodology was used to examine the elements of an emergent writing program of two kindergarten teachers. The study hoped to define a classroom environment that is conducive to literacy and writing using best…

This study proposes a Wiki-based collaborative writing approach to the writing process for EFL (English as a foreign language) learners. A five-stage computer-mediated collaborative writing project including collaborative planning, partitioned drafting, peer-revising, peer-editing, and individual publishing was blended with on-campus English…

Citation is one of the most prominent features of academic writing through which academic writers both exhibit the breadth of their scholarship in a specific research area and subtly demonstrate their memberships of the disciplinary community. Citations are important rhetorical devices that allow seasoned writers to promote their current research…

This paper introduces readers to Wordle, a data visualization tool, and describes how word clouds, or wordles generated by Wordle, were used in an action research project designed to facilitate the teaching of foreign language (FL) writing within a dual coding theoretical framework. Over the course of one semester, students in a third-semester…

This article synthesizes and extends data from some of the most prominent and promising large-scale research projects in writing studies while also presenting results from the authors' own research. By juxtaposing these studies, the authors offer a complex understanding of writing practices at the high school and college level. Future directions…

Summary writing has been considered an important aspect of academic writing. However, writing summaries can be a challenging task for the majority of English as a Foreign Language (EFL) learners. Research into teaching summary writing has focused on different processes to teach EFL learners. The present study adopted two methods--keyword and…

This study investigated the effectiveness of cognitive strategy instruction in writing with adult literacy learners. Three middle-aged African-American adults participating in adult education with the goal of passing the GED received tutoring in a strategy for planning, writing, and revising persuasive essays along with self-regulation strategies.…

This project questions a core value that writing center workers have long held about tutoring writing: that we change writers. Applying sociocognitive and Bakhtinian lenses, I was able to complicate theory-practice connections. Tutor-tutee negotiations during tutorials, tutees' perceived learning outcomes, and their revisions were compared with…

Taking an assertive stance toward research being reviewed or reported is a challenging task for second language writers. This aspect of interpersonal meaning is especially difficult to address through direct instruction, as attention to particular grammatical and lexical choices outside of contexts of use is not enough to help students develop the…

This study was designed to identify, through mediation analysis, potential causal mechanisms by which procedures of self-regulated learning increase the efficaciousness of teaching young students strategies for writing stories. In a randomized controlled trial with 3 measurement points (pretest, posttest, maintenance), 117 fourth graders either…