Because of consistent faculty involvement from its earliest stages, the writing assessment program at the University of Missouri at Kansas City (UMKC) represents a competent, fair, and useful procedure for the large-scale testing and evaluation of student writing. UMKC's assessment curriculum builds on the existing sequence of three composition…

Created as one part of a comprehensive curriculum for teaching writing from kindergarten through twelfth grade, this guide focuses on expressive writing. Following an introduction describing the goals of the writing project, the preface points out that the guide is based on the comprehensive model of James Kinneavy's "A Theory of Discourse,…

Sentence combining activities can be used throughout the English curriculum. The entire composing process can be developed with sentence combining activities based on student rough drafts of book reports, analysis and imitation of sentences written by professional writers, the organization of sentences in whole paragraphs or essays, and "oral…

A project to investigate the effects on the language development of secondary school pupils of a study of transformational grammar as represented in the Oregon English Curriculum involved 250 students in a large, coeducational high school near Auckland, New Zealand. The students were divided into three matched groups who studied different English…

The report of the Bullock Committee of Enquiry was published in January 1975, under the title "A Language for Life," and presented extensive recommendations concerning all aspects of English teaching, including reading, writing, talking, and listening, the role of initial and inservice training, and monitoring of general levels of…

Conflict is the basis of all stories and thus should appear in some form in the first sentence. There are three kinds of conflict: people vs. people; people vs. nature; and people vs. themselves. Conflict must be repeated in all the various elements of the story's structure, including the plot, which is the plan of action telling what happens to…

This paper describes a freshman composition course at a community college which was taught by television and which included thirty 30-minute tapes and an accompanying study guide. Entitled "Writing for a Reason," the primary objective of the course was to help students write effectively so they will be able to fulfill their writing requirements in…

Contrary to the usual design of curriculum materials, those of the Hawaii English Program (H.E.P.) are not handbooks for teachers. The H.E.P. materials--literature, in this case--consist of booklets for students who thus bear the responsibility for setting their own pace according to their interests, needs, and abilities. The total classroom…

A quinmester course in English for fifth grade students is outlined in this guide. The primary purpose of the course is to develop language through current literature; a secondary purpose is to acquaint the pupils with different forms of current literature. The four areas of the course are Musical Lyrics, Current Articles, Short Stories, and…

A three-week conference on the future of the English curriculum in elementary through postsecondary education is discussed. English students would study a variety of works. They would analyze the historical, cultural, and political dimensions of what they read and writing would be an integral part of the curriculum. (MLW)

Discusses influences on the English curriculum of the l966 Dartmouth Conference and the educational and societal changes since then, some differences between British and American education, beginning language study with the language of speakers and writers in the classroom, and an interview with John Dixon about gaining knowledge from…

Discusses changes in teaching English since the Dartmouth Conference. Discusses issues in education in the mid-l960s; the second international conference at York University in England; the third international conference at Sydney, Australia; and the l984 international seminar at East Lansing, Michigan. (EL)

Developed for at-risk youth and designed to help all students experience success in school and in the real world, this curriculum guide is presented in a large-size, loose-leaf format for easy access and use. The guide features a flexible, six-semester curriculum that builds literacy skills in students while developing their core worker…

Presents a unit for use in high school English classes on "A Short History of American Painting, Colonial Period Through 1900," and discusses how it was developed. The unit was used in the ninth grade, but it can be modified to facilitate the teaching of a variety of skills at any grade level. (JM)

Placing literature in the core of the curriculum, along with lots of writing and some listening and speaking activities, is a wonderful idea, one which most good English programs and teachers have always used, even through the electives and the back-to-basics periods of recent years. The gap lies in the teaching of writing, especially knowledge…