Teaching Writing

This popular text examines literacy from a multidimensional and interdisciplinary perspective. It "unpackages" the various dimensions of literacy--linguistic, cognitive, sociocultural, and developmental--and at the same time accounts for the interrelationships among them. The goal is to provide a conceptual foundation upon which literacy curriculum and instruction in school settings can be grounded. Dimensions of Literacy: A Conceptual Base for Teaching Reading and Writing in School Settings, Second Edition: *Links theory and research to practice in an understandable, user-friendly manner--in each chapter as well as in a final chapter focused exclusively on instructional implications; *Provides in-depth coverage of the various dimensions of literacy--linguistic (the nature of language, oral-written language relationships, language variation); cognitive (constructive nature of perception, the reading process, understanding written discourse, the writing process); sociocultural (literacy as social practices, authority of written discourse); and developmental (constructing the written language system); and *Includes demonstrations and hands-on activities; authentic reading and writing events that reflect key linguistic, cognitive, sociocultural, and developmental concepts; and tables and figures that summarize the concepts. New in the Second Edition: *Expanded discussion of the "reading wars," the nature of perception during reading, the comprehension process, and the writing process; *Separate chapters on the nature of oral and spoken language relationships, and understanding written discourse; and *Integration of instructional implications and pedagogy throughout all chapters. Educational institutions--and teachers in particular--are currently under intense scrutiny as the standards movement and high-stakes testing increasingly determine what is taught, when it is taught, and how it is taught. If literacy teachers are to have a voice in these policies and practices, it is critical that they have an understanding of what literacy entails. Because they work with students' reading and writing on a daily basis, teachers have an intuitive sense of the complexities of the literacy processes. The intent of Dimensions of Literacy: A Conceptual Base for Teaching Reading and Writing in School Settings, Second Edition is to make this teacher knowledge explicit, as well as to more fully develop it. It is essential reading for all teachers and students in the field of literacy education.

Focused on scholarship in rhetoric and composition over the past quarter-century, Concepts in Composition: Theory and Practice in the Teaching of Writing is designed to foster reflection on how theory impacts practice, enabling prospective teachers to develop their own comprehensive and coherent conception of what writing is or should be and to consider how people learn to write. This approach allows readers to assume the dual role of both teacher and student as they enter the conversation of the discipline and become familiar with some of the critical issues. Each chapter addresses a particular theoretical concept relevant to classroom teaching and includes activities to help readers establish the connection between theoretical concepts and classroom lessons. A major premise is that only when prospective writing teachers understand this relationship will they be able to teach effectively. The chapters, designed to facilitate this understanding, include: an overview of a significant concept in composition that has generated scholarly attention, and in some instances, critical controversy over the past 25 years; writing assignments and discussion prompts to foster further exploration of the concept; thought-provoking articles; bibliographies for further research; and suggestions for classroom activities to apply the concept in a pedagogical context. The text is enriched by seven chapters authored by invited scholars with expertise in particular concepts of composition. Two appendixes-"Developing Effective Writing Assignments" and "Developing a Syllabus" enhance the pedagogical usefulness of the text.

This volume offers concrete answers to the question of how we can use imagery to enrich the teaching of reading and writing. The chapters are organized according to two guiding principles. First, each addresses specific aspects of the inextricable integration of imagery and language in the teaching of reading and writing. Imagery is not privileged over language; the fusion of the two is emphasized. Second, each focuses on a particular kind of imagery--mental, graphic, or verbal--describing teaching/learning strategies based on the deployment of that kind of imagery in the classroom. There is currently a renewed acknowledgment of the importance of imagery in meaning. The rapid spread of the World Wide Web, computer interfacing, and virtual reality further highlights the need to attend to the influence of imagery in a networked world. In response to these shifts in scholarly and cultural perspectives, NCTE has established a committee on visual literacy, and an emphasis on visual literacy has been incorporated into the IRA/NCTE Standards for the English Language Arts. This book contributes significantly toward filling the need for explicit and specific theory-based methods teachers can use to integrate imagery into their pedagogy. Accessible and lively chapters include classroom activities and student-generated examples. Language and Image in the Reading-Writing Classroom is an excellent text for preservice and in-service pedagogy courses and an important resource for practicing teachers, researchers, and professionals in the field.

Preparing to Teach Writing: Research, Theory, and Practice, Third Edition is a comprehensive survey of theories, research, and methods associated with teaching composition successfully. The primary goal is to provide practicing and prospective teachers with the knowledge they need to be effective teachers of writing and to prepare them for the many challenges they will face in the classroom. Overall, the third edition of Preparing to Teach Writing is clearer and more comprehensive than the previous editions. It combines the best of the old with new information and features. The discussions and references to foundational studies that helped define the field of rhetoric and composition are preserved in this edition. Also preserved is most of the pedagogical apparatus that characterized the first two editions; research and theory are examined with the aim of informing teaching.

Student academic writing is at the heart of teaching and learning in higher education. Students are assessed largely by what they write, and need to learn both general academic conventions as well as disciplinary writing requirements in order to be successful in higher education. Teaching Academic Writing is a 'toolkit' designed to help higher education lecturers and tutors teach writing to their students. Containing a range of diverse teaching strategies, the book offers both practical activities to help students develop their writing abilities and guidelines to help lecturers and tutors think in more depth about the assessment tasks they set and the feedback they give to students. The authors explore a wide variety of text types, from essays and reflective diaries to research projects and laboratory reports. The book draws on recent research in the fields of academic literacy, second language learning, and linguistics. It is grounded in recent developments such as the increasing diversity of the student body, the use of the Internet, electronic tuition, and issues related to distance learning in an era of increasing globalisation.Written by experienced teachers of writing, language, and linguistics, Teaching Academic Writing will be of interest to anyone involved in teaching academic writing in higher education.

In this ethnographic study of the teaching of writing, Karen Surman Paley reveals the social significance of first-person writing and the limitations of a popular taxonomy of composition studies. Paley looks critically at the way social constructionists have created an "Other" in the field of composition studies and named it "expressivist".

Paley demonstrates the complexity of approaches to teaching writing through an ethnographic study of two composition faculty at Boston College, a program that some would say is "expressivist". She prompts her colleagues to consider how family experiences shape the way students feel about and treat people of races, religions, genders, and sexual preferences other than their own. Finally, she suggests to the field of composition that practitioners spend less time shoring up taxonomies of the field and more time sharing pedagogies.

This text is designed specifically to meet the needs of preservice teachers who have had little experience working in middle-grade classrooms. Three ideas are central: * teaching language arts at the middle level is a complex activity that demands expertise in the use of a variety of strategies, * reading and writing are key processes of language arts study, but so are speaking, listening, and viewing/visually representing, and * teaching the processes of effective communication is crucial, but middle school students must also begin to learn the content of the field--literature, language, and media. Teaching Language Arts in Middle Schools gives balanced attention to various teaching strategies, processes, and content, demonstrating how all of these connect to improve students' abilities to communicate. In this text: *Research and theory are summarized and applied to practice *A non-prescriptive approach is integrated with practical information *Debates in the field are acknowledged *Additional reading and research are emphasized *The author's voice and point of view are explicit