This book surveys the history of basic writing scholarship, suggesting that we cannot adequately theorize the situations of basic writers unless we examine how they construct their own conceptions of their identities, their constructions of their relationships to social forces, and their representations of their relationships to written work. Using a cross-disciplinary analytic model, Gray-Rosendale offers a detailed examination of the oral conversations that take place within one basic writing peer revision group. She explains the ways in which the students' own conversational structures impact and shape their written products. Gray-Rosendale then draws out the potentials of her work for basic writing administrators, curricula builders, and teachers.

The traditional Western view of writing, from Aristotle down to the present day, has treated the written word as a visual substitute for the spoken word. The eminent Swiss linguist Ferdinand de Saussure (1857-1913) was the first to provide this traditional assumption with a reasoned basis by incorporating it into a more general theory of signs. In the wake of Saussure's work, modern linguistics has ignored or marginalized writing in favour of the study of speech. In all literate societies, however, speech in turn is interpreted by reference to the culturally dominant writing system. This puts in place a system of educational values which ensures that the more literate members of society maintain superiority over the less literate, and at the same time establishes a hierarchy among literate societies which favours the local product (alphabetic scripts in the Western Case). Roy Harris shows that the theory of writing adopted in modern linguistics is deeply flawed. Reversing the orthodox priorities, the author argues that writing is a far more powerful mode of linguistic communication than speech could ever be. His book is a major contribution to current debates about human communication written and spoken.

This primary textbook for courses on theories & methods of teaching at the college writing level brings together seminal articles, followed by questions for reflection, writing, and discussion.

In Writing Through Childhood, Shelley dares us to rethink our beliefs about how we design writing workshops, use writer's notebooks, choose appropriate genres, and teach spelling.

Reviews the research of foreign language and ESL writing pedagogy and suggest new teaching methods for college and high school instructors based on recent developments in the field. Includes a comprehensive review of the literature, specific sugestions for activities and recommendations on integrating software into the writing curriculum.

Gunther Kress argues for a radical reappraisal of the phenomenon of literacy, and hence for a profound shift in educational practice. Through close attention to the variety of objects which children constantly produce (drawings, cuttings-out, 'writings' and collages), Kress suggests a set of principles which reveal the underlying coherence of children's actions; actions which allow us to connect them with attempts to make meaning before they acquire language and writing. This book provides fundamental challenges to commonly held assumptions about both language and literacy, thought and action. It places these challenges within the context of speculation about the abilities and dispositions essential for children as young adults, and calls for the radical decentring of language in educational theory and practice.

Provides resources for teaching elementary and secondary school students about Christopher Columbus and the discovery of America.