Assessment of writing for technical purposes is oriented in the main toward standards developed in accordance with general literacy goals and composing practices developed in English Language Studies for Writing-Across the Curriculum programs. Increasingly, interpretation of technical writing practices cast it as being defined by direct participation in the work of disciplinary communities. This dissertation shows, first, how criteria for assessing technical writing changes dramatically when developed from this “situated” perspective. Second, it suggests that such development provides improved support for overall technical writing pedagogy—practically, by articulating the goals and expectations of the competent members who form the disciplinary community teaching any novice; and ethically, by providing ways to insure the presence of resources for thinking critically about the work and developing in it toward informed interaction with a wider community, in or out of the discipline.

Data on situated technical writing practices and their assessment by competent members of a technical and scientific community were gathered during a participant-observer year in the School of Engineering at the University of Guelph. The character and operation of the work of engineering are highlighted by comparing them to the specifications for writing outlined in technical writing textbooks currently in use. As the inquiry proceeds, it focuses on three key issues: (1) how members of a discipline orient to work through writing; (2) what resources of document, text, and language are used for writing situated in the engineering disciplines; and (3) why engineering writing pointedly includes graphical as well as lexical ways of articulating substantive material. These topics effectively form questions that arise and are answered in the course of making the comparisons that form the focal points of the central chapters.

As its outcome, this study produces a local and particular inspection of what a group of expert engineers takes to be techniques adequate to writing for technical purposes. Featuring three separate considerations of physical documents and their design, the creation and uses of text formats, and the specialized deployment of graphical and lexical language resources, the central chapters detail how expectations for writing practices are seen from the point of view of the actors who are the expert members of the disciplinary community. By establishing this situated vantage point, the study seeks to initiate inquiry into the relationship between the assumptions made in competent members writing assessment practices and those invoked by the practices in writing pedagogy as it is viewed from the situation of the humanities-trained instructor. The claim made here is that writing approached from the actor's point-of-view has a significantly increased chance of being accepted as rational action, or practices meeting the expectations placed on it by a disciplinary community. This study suggests, finally, that we can draw on the coincidence of what is achieved with what is expected to develop criteria for response and evaluation that will reinforce both our practical and ethical reasons for teaching technical writing.

Klein, William D.. (1999). The Political and Economic Impacts of Writing Across the Curriculum in Chemistry at the University of Missouri-St. Louis (University of Missouri St. Louis, Missouri, Composition). | View Details

Writing Across the Curriculum at most institutions is a web of local knowledges and techniques “situated” within the historical and immediate contexts of academic departments, disciplines, and disciplinary cultures. Because of political and economic tensions existing within colleges and universities, and within academic disciplines themselves, WAC can become a “contact zone,” where individuals and institutional structures struggle for power, influence, and in some cases, survival.

This dissertation uses the work of Anthony Giddens and Pierre Bourdieu to examine such a struggle as it occurred at the University of Missouri-St. Louis in the early 1980s. A WAC program was initiated there, but eventually failed as a result of political and economic influences. In the time since that failure, a growing emphasis on teaching and learning has helped create new potential for WAC at UMSL. Yet, to make it viable, WAC proponents there must recognize existing realities, attitudes, and conventions within each discipline or department, and develop new methods and approaches to writing and teaching that are relevant to that discipline or department.

This examination then focuses on writing in chemistry to discover the realities, attitudes, and conventions used in teaching and learning writing at the undergraduate level. Standards for content acquisition are gathered from ACS accreditation requirements, and from a study of educators and practitioners from a variety of professions. A study of Chemistry students in an NSF-funded educational program suggests that science students may learn as much or more about disciplinary discourse from sources other than the traditional writing course. Interaction with the literature and with graduate students, professors, and professionals may teach students more about disciplinary discourse conventions than a composition-trained specialist might accomplish in a writing course. Still, the writing course can be useful. These findings suggest that writing can be woven into the chemistry curriculum in a number of ways.

Interviews with UMSL faculty and administrators suggest new instantiations of WAC that might better thrive in today's political and economic environment. What takes shape might serve as a model for other institutions to follow.

Lawwill, Kenneth S.. (1999). Using Writing-To-Learn Strategies: Promoting Peer Collaboration Among High School Science Teachers. | View Details

Writing-to-learn strategies have been well documented in the promotion of student learning (Poirrier, 1997c). Less is known about how teachers come to use these strategies in every day instruction. This study is a description of the experiences of one science teacher at a large suburban high school who shared writing-to-learn strategies with his department to promote the use of these strategies in daily instruction of his colleagues. The strategies involved (1) improving reading comprehension using paraphrasing, (2) activating prior knowledge using generic questions: who, what, where, when, why, & how, and (3) writing before and after other classroom activities to activate prior knowledge and then better integrate new information. The strategies were shared during informal meetings at lunch. Participation was voluntary. of the eighteen faculty members, four chose to implement the strategies on a longer-term basis. Follow-up analysis in subsequent years, showed that the strategies were still in use and that the colleagues who used the strategies had passed them on to newly inducted members of the department. Results were discussed with regards to how teachers acquire or decline the incorporation of new teaching ideas in the normal course of their work in collegial settings.

Lee, Wan-I. (1999). The Relationship Between Students' Proof-Writing Ability and Van Hiele Levels of Geometric Thought in a College Geometry Course (College Students). | View Details

This study combined qualitative and quantitative approaches with a dominant qualitative emphasis that focused on college students' reasoning skills and proof writing abilities in relation to their van Hiele levels (VHL) in geometry. Twelve students enrolled in a Modern Geometry class were included in the quantitative Approach. A two-tailed t-test at the 0.05 significant level was used to analyze the difference between students' scores on a Van Hiele Geometry pretest and posttest. Two qualitative case studies were employed to explore two different subjects' (VHL I and VHL III) development of reasoning and proof-writing ability. The data was interpreted in the context of specific and unique proof schemes..Quantitative results showed no significant differences between scores on the VHL pretest and posttest for participants in the college geometry class. Future recommendations include using a larger sample size, and considering other teaching styles (such as teaching with technology) that may affect the research results..Qualitative results showed that the VHL I student improved to level V and the VHL III student remained at the same level. However, both of them improved their reasoning skills and their ability to construct their own proofs. This evidence supported the notion that even VHL I students may be capable of identifying hypotheses and drawing their own conclusions. However, the researcher only investigated two participants' learning behaviors for one semester. A longitudinal study following students over several semesters may reveal more about the development of their proof schemes and proof-writing processes.

Oates, Scott F.. (1999). Literacy as an Everyday Practice: Case Studies of Students and Literacy Instruction in High School, Community College and University Writing Classes. | View Details

This dissertation focused on literacy practices as interpretive social activities. This is to say that the Theoretical framework for this study viewed literacy practices from an interpretive perspective or, more specifically as discourse. Literacy as discourse means that literacy practices are also ways of enacting one's identity and social relationships. The problem this study focused on then, concerned the ways in which students made sense and use of the discourse of the literacy instruction they received in relation to their family and peer discourses. A secondary problem this study focused on was the differences in the discourses of high school, community college, and university writing classes..The design of this study consisted of case studies in three sites: a semester in a 12th grade English class, and a quarter each in a community college and university composition class. for each site, there were three case study participants. Data collected consisted of participant observation, documents, and interviews. The data collection was directed at the variety of discourses students engaged in their everyday life (i.e., classroom, peer groups, family, church) and the ways in which they forged and suppressed links and understandings among them. This study includes thick descriptions of students' literacy practices and the literacy pedagogies they encounter as discourses..This study was not designed to be generalizeable. Instead this study illustrates that if literacy learning (and literacy teaching) are interpretive social activities, and that the everyday is a complex socioliterate site, then literacy curriculum and pedagogy need to be designed (1) to account for and build upon the social practices that students are already proficient in, and (2) to guide students to understand that they are learning not simply new forms of written language, but that more so, they are learning to participate in unfamiliar forms of social interaction.

Allred, Cathleen F.. (1998). Literacy and Literary Instruction: Interns' Perceptions (Preservice). | View Details

The purpose of this naturalistic study was to better understand the experiences of interns as they engaged in literacy instruction during, the second semester of the year-long internship. Through increased understanding about how interns' experience teaching literacy during the year-long field experience those in positions of educating new teachers may gain insight into how to structure teacher education in literacy in ways that may be more meaningful and relevant. Qualitative methods of data collection included classroom observations, interviews, and document examination. Data were collected from three elementary school interns over a five month period which spanned the Spring semester of their internship year. One interns was teaching first grade, two interns were teaching fourth grade. Qualitative analysis of the data was used to answer the following research questions: (1) What does literacy mean to interns? (2) How do interns construct their perceptions of literacy? (3) What does literacy instruction mean to interns? (4) How do interns experience literacy instruction in the classroom context? (5) How do interns construct their perceptions of literacy instruction? Findings from data analysis revealed the following similarities Across interns: (1) Literacy means reading and writing in ways that communicate meaning for enjoyment, for learning, and to accomplish one's goals in life. (2) Interns construct their perceptions of literacy in literate environments, with literate role models, and expectations for literate behavior. (3) By the end of the internship year, interns articulated clearly that literacy instruction meant the teaching of reading and writing as integrated processes, in both student-directed and teacher-directed-ways. (4) Interns experienced literary instruction as the application of social strategies that enabled them to assert autonomy in stressful situations. Interns used conformity, compromise, and change to actively adapt to perceived contextual constraints. (5) Interns constructed their perceptions of literacy instruction through school biographies, teacher education course work, field experiences, and professional development activities. Implications for teacher education in literary were based on the findings that interns saw themselves as learners throughout the internship experience. Interns completed the year-long internship with the perception that they were still learning to teach literacy.

Harper, Michael T.. (1998). Revolution Or Colonialism: The Role of English Departments in the Writing Across the Curriculum Movement. | View Details

As Writing Across the Curriculum (WAC) enters its third decade, it is faced with the challenge to advance collaborative models of program development. Older models, characterized by a missionary zeal to spread the Gospel of writing-based pedagogies, have recently been criticized by scholars as imperialistic. Susan McLeod, Catherine Blair, Christine Farris, and Mary Minock all have argued that these models ignore important differences in how writing is taught within the disciplines. Moreover, they charge, the missionary zeal that characterizes much of WAC scholarship also ignores the cultural differences of the disciplines. Needed is a multi-cultural model of WAC that fosters rather than inhibits disciplinary interaction.

In this dissertation, I Theorize a “contact zone” model for WAC program development. In “Arts of the Contact Zone,” Mary Louise Pratt describes the indeterminate space where cultures come in contact. She notes that this space can either be a site of colonialism or a site of dialogic exchange. While Pratt neither addresses WAC nor disciplinary cultures, her model of the “contact zone” provides a useful analogue for conceiving a dialogic exchange among disciplines. In order to apply Pratt's model to WAC, I rely on the work of Julie Thompson Klein who has Theorized the various types of multi-disciplinary, transdisciplinary, and interdisciplinary exchanges among the disciplinary cultures that can be collaborative and productive. Klein provides the disciplinary antecedent to Pratt's multi-cultural Theory. In addition, I suggest Donald Schon's reflective practices as a methodology for negotiating these exchanges. Schon's Theory focuses on the experiential knowledge of professionals that contributes to their expertise. By linking Pratt, Klein, and Schon, I Theorize WAC as a space where disciplinary cultures come in contact to reflect upon and to discuss writing-based pedagogies. The outcomes of this activity, I argue, are various forms of multi-disciplinary, transdisciplinary, and interdisciplinary knowledge that help build on WAC's foundation.

Kreth, Melinda Lee. (1998). Writing, Learning, and Persuading: The Experiences of Women Engineering Co-Op Students. | View Details

The current study examined women engineering co-op students learning about engineering discourse practices in the workplace. The study included a survey of recent engineering graduates (92 men, 84 women) of Midtown University (a pseudonym), and case studies of five women Midtown engineering students enrolled in co-op during spring and summer 1997. Survey results aided in designing the case studies, which examined more closely the experiences of women co-op students in a variety of workplace environments, and who were majoring in engineering fields that have been identified as particularly attractive to women: civil, chemical, and industrial engineering. The case studies relied heavily on interviews, site visits, and writing samples. Although the survey provided useful information about the amount of time respondents believed they spent writing during co-op, the kinds of documents they wrote, and aids for learning to write, the case studies revealed the complexity of the learning process, involving the quality of the mentoring relationship between and student, the availability of sample documents to model, the presence of supportive co-workers, students' prior writing experience and disciplinary knowledge gained in school, the kinds of tasks students' are assigned during co-op, and students' engineering specialty and gender. Perhaps the most important finding was that the women studied here all believed that engineers use writing to persuade, which seems to contradict previous research suggesting that engineers do not view their writing as persuasive, but as simply presenting facts that speak for themselves. It is unclear whether or to what extent gender may have influenced the women's perceptions about engineers' use of persuasion; it is perhaps more likely that they were attracted to engineering fields and co-oped in workplaces in which persuasion was integral to the work of engineers. Future research needs to compare the perceptions of men and women engineers Across engineering specialties and workplace contexts. The study findings have implications for researchers and teachers of business and technical communication, writing in non-academic settings, experiential learning, gender studies, writing Across the curriculum, and writing in the disciplines.

Zerbe, Michael J.. (1998). Toward a Cultural Studies-Based Pedagogy for the Rhetoric of Science (Composition, Writing Across the Curriculum). | View Details

The purpose of this study is to propose, justify, and Theorize a cultural studies-based pedagogy for the rhetoric of science that would be useful in composition and writing Across the curriculum courses. In contemporary western society, which ascribes truth to knowledge gained by science, scientific discourse reigns as the most privileged rhetoric and is often not questioned. The development of a cultural studies-based pedagogy would potentially allow students to gain a critical perspective of this type of discourse—that is, to learn to recognize the inherent rhetorical characteristics of producing and analyzing it—so that they can make more well-informed decisions about the numerous scientific and technological issues that face them and so that they can learn to recognize that their writing can help to construct science. To Theorize this pedagogy, work from postmodern Theorists on disciplinarity and power (Foucault), language (Lyotard), and education (Usher and Edwards) is combined with Althusser's notion of an ideological state apparatus to demonstrate how science operates as a powerful cultural institution that inscribes subjects. The roots of contemporary scientific discourse in the Renaissance are then explored to demonstrate that scientific rhetoric, as with any other form of rhetoric—arose from specific historical circumstances and self-interest. To connect these explorations of science/scientific discourse with the mission of composition, various conceptions of literacy as perceived by humanities scholars and scientific literacy as perceived by scientists and science educators are discussed. The contrast demonstrates that scientific literacy is often thought of in uncritical terms. Cultural studies is then introduced as a means of establishing a pedagogy for achieving a more complex scientific literacy. A case-based pedagogy that results from this Theorizing is introduced.

Harper, Kathy R.. (1997). Composing as Meaning-Making: An Examination of Third- Grade Students' Composing Strategies and Behaviors Across Curricular Areas (Writing). | View Details

This study explored the writing strategies and behaviors demonstrated by four third-grade learners as they composed Across Language Arts, Social Studies, and Science. Writing episodes were examined in light of the influence of models upon the student writing product. It is the case that there are distinctive patterns Across learners, yet individual differences not representative of the group exist. Instructional models found in text provided by the classroom teacher, literature sources, the environment, and other students influenced student writing. These models were imitated by students both in format and actual imitation of text. The students were more likely to imitate format of literature sources and teacher models when composing in the area of Language Arts. In the subject areas of Social Studies and Science, the students more frequently imitated the text as it appeared in source documents. Students' writing processes consisted of three universal components: planning, drafting (or transcribing), and revision. These components appeared in a recursive nature. The students often planned what would be written as they wrote. This planning took form most frequently in planning self-talk, the verbal announcement or think- aloud process of deciding what to put on paper. The greatest percentage of student writing time was spent drafting, or putting words on paper without pausing to plan or revise. This drafting behavior consisted of students imitating format or actual text. The students used the existing text to derive a new text, but this text was generally not original, nor did it synthesize the information given from sources into new configurations. Within the drafting, students attended to spelling and mechanics a small portion of the time. Attention to revision occurred less frequently. The types of revision behaviors exhibited by students varied.

Mccartan-Welch, Kathleen M.. (1997). Resistance and Reflection: The Humanities Experience for Medical Students (Writing Across the Curriculum). | View Details

The single largest divide in academia is centered between humanistic and scientific disciplines. The separation of these two disciplinary ideologies stems from centuries of stereotypical assumptions about both modes of interpreting reality. for example Albert Levi confidently states In The Humanities Today that " (I) f those in the science and those in the humanities ... misunderstand one another, ... this is hardly surprising ... they think differently ... (and) speak two separate languages"(56). Thomas Kuhn argues that when universities teach science as a "linear," left-brain only process, they misrepresent how the practice of science actually works. One group of students particularly vulnerable to the effects of polarizing humanistic and scientific ways of knowing are medical students, since until the early 1980s, the majority of medical schools exclusively relied on the sciences to teach medical students how to be effective practitioners. In the last ten years, however, a group of scholars known as medical humanists have begun to work against medical students' narrowly focused schooling by exposing them to literature and writing, two rarely required activities in medical school. In targeting their efforts toward humanizing the field of medicine, medical humanists are filling a gap in academia since few current interdisciplinary programs link the science and the humanities. This dissertation is a qualitative ethnographic study of one medical humanities program located at the University of Missouri- Kansas City Medical School (UMKC). It centers on two questions: (1) In this medical humanities interdisciplinary environment, what instances are there when medical students exhibit thoughts/behavior/ideas not considered during other stages of their medical training? and (2) What instances are there when medical students exhibit traditional, academic or science-based behaviors in this non-traditional, humanities-based educational environment? In its concluding chapters, this study demonstrates that although medical students primarily utilized traditional science-based learning tools during this particular medical humanities experience (e.g., they recorded 'facts,' resisted abstract descriptions, and tuned-out 'irrelevant' (e.g., personal) stories), they did begin to conceptualize themselves as active participators in the world of medicine by recognizing that there is an interpretive level to doctor/patient interactions. In summary, because these medical students had "to read in the fullest sense," and learn how to " (tolerate) ambiguity" during this medical humanities experience, they had to begin realistically preparing for actual "doctor/patient encounters" (Trautmann 32).

Bowie, Robert L.. (1996). Future Teachers' Perceptions of Themselves as Writers and Teachers of Writing: Implications for Teacher Education Programs (Student Teachers). | View Details

Much of teachers' resistance to integrating writing instruction in their classroom comes from their poor perceptions of themselves as writers, and uncertainty about how to teach and foster writing. The present study was conducted to discover how future teachers viewed themselves as writers and writing teachers and how these identities were being addressed in teacher education programs. Two hundred twenty-six student teachers responded to a questionnaire designed to measure both writing apprehension and beliefs about the role and responsibility of all teachers in teaching writing. In addition, 60 teacher education students responded in journal form to questions about themselves as writers. These responses were analyzed for recurring patterns and themes. Finally, faculty from a large teacher education program were asked to respond to questions related to how and to what extent the identity of the teacher as a writer and a teacher of writing was treated in their respective courses and programs. State guidelines for teacher education, along with course outlines, were also reviewed. Results revealed that future teachers' feelings about writing are heavily influenced by the nature of the writing task and whether or not the writing is being evaluated. In addition, most future teachers desire more writing instruction than what they receive. Regarding teaching writing, future teachers believe in the importance of writing Across the curriculum and teaching writing as a process, but do not express a desire to teach writing. Specifically, they lack confidence in evaluating the writing of others. It was also discovered that the identity of the teacher as a writer and teacher of writing is addressed minimally in teacher preparation programs. Recommendations for improvement of teacher education in addressing these important issues include allowing for more student choice in writing assignments, using journals extensively as tools for expression and reflection, reducing writing apprehension through process-oriented approaches, building more writing instruction and training in teaching writing into the teacher education program, addressing the identity of the teacher as a writer earlier in the preparation program, and providing more training for teacher educators interested in developing the writing attitudes and abilities of their students.

Gibson-Allen, Jeanette A.. (1996). The Writing Requirements of Four Freshman Courses: Patterns of Writing Across the Curriculum (Composition). | View Details

Statement of the problem. The goal of this study was to determine the writing requirements of four freshman courses, describe the effects of the perceptions of students and instructors on student writing performance, and identify patterns of writing Across the curriculum. Methods. Selected data from a larger study were analyzed to describe similarities within and among these courses, the effect of the perceptions of students and instructors on student writing performance, and ways in which student writing activities were repeated Across the curriculum. Several research questions guided the data analysis. The questions encompassed the following four parameters: (a) writing requirements revealed through cognitive units of the four courses, (b) writing connections among courses, (c) student and faculty approaches to writing, and (d) patterns of writing requirements Across courses. Data from student surveys, classroom observations, interview transcripts, faulty dialog transcripts, audiotapes, documents and other materials were analyzed on a post hoc basis using constant comparison, componential analysis, and analytic induction. Specific strategies employed during this study included coding categorizing, questioning, annotating, triangulating, synthesizing, and arranging data in tabular form. Results. The data analysis revealed that writing requirements were of two kinds, stated and implicit. Teachers assigned stated writing requirements, while students identified and tried to meet implicit writing demands. Student approaches to writing occurred at three levels, global, academic, and subject. Most students seemed to have perceptions of writing at the subject level that were determined by the requirements of their freshman composition classes. Evidence of writing Across the curriculum was seen in the strategies students employed Across courses to meet implicit writing demands. Conclusions. Students are forced to evolve their own strategies for success at college. The students likely to do this belong to three categories: Those who had advanced courses in high school, those who completed development studies in college, and those who were mature adults. Secondly, strategies students used in meeting implicit writing demands were used Across the curriculum. This fact provides a rationale for expanding the focus of writing Across the curriculum programs to include student writers rather than just concentrate on writing teaching.

Velez, Lili F.. (1995). Interpreting and Writing in the Laboratory: A Study of Novice Biologists as Novice Rhetors. | View Details

While rhetoricians of science describe how professional scientists accomplish their persuasive tasks, not much is known about the processes by which beginning science students begin to acquire the confidence and skill necessary to be persuasive to themselves or others about their work. This thesis examines how an upper-level biology laboratory course shapes novice biologists into novice rhetors: these novices are placed in situations where they must learn to persuade themselves and attempt to persuade others. It also illustrates how the colliding values of those novices, the values of their instructor and my own values as a visiting rhetorician led to collaborations none of us had originally intended. New research in the rhetoric of specific academic disciplines seems to offer great opportunities for developing connections to disciplines, especially those in the sciences, which have been reticent in the past about participating in Writing Across the Curriculum (WAC) programs. However, amassing data about professional rhetorics is a mixed blessing. Such new knowledge may make writing professionals feel more comfortable and lead them to believe that they are more competent than they probably should feel in another discipline's territory. This can lead to inappropriate assumptions about what novices should be expected to accomplish and what kinds of independent critical thinking they should be practicing. I have found that the kinds of student autonomy and creativity which many writing professionals value in their students may well be off-limits, or be considered a premature hazard, to the students within other disciplines. This ethnography combines three years of laboratory observations and case studies of seven student informants during a one semester course in molecular biology and genetics. By examining the students' activities and the environment in which they do their work, I identify and examine some of the ways novices perform two basic rhetorical tasks: how they persuade themselves, and how they try to persuade others, about their data. This provides a 'take' on how such student activities are situated within a scientific culture, and how different task and role representations can help or hinder students' evolution as agents. This in turn can give writing professionals a more grounded understanding of how the goals of students, communities, and instructors will enable and constrain their efforts.

Gumnior, Elisabeth C.. (1994). The Effects of Writing Across the Curriculum Efforts on School of Business Faculty at Indiana University. | View Details

This study describes the short- and long-term effects a four-year writing-Across-the-curriculum (WAC) project had on selected School of Business faculty. Based on classroom observations and interviews, the study examines how the faculty reacted to the WAC practices the writing consultants brought into undergraduate business courses and how these reactions were related to factors specific to business education, such as the close connection between business school departments and the business community. Chapter One introduces the major questions driving the study. Chapter Two describes the writing consultant project. The three consultants all had different philosophies and pedagogical approaches. The differences among them influenced the development of the program, and shaped the faculty's responses. Chapter Three discusses changes in the undergraduate accounting curriculum. Many of these changes are motivated by professional organizations and the business community who have considerable influence on the classroom practice of faculty and their attitudes toward models of curricular change such as the writing consultant project. Chapter Four examines these attitudes in detail by providing the case studies of two accounting professors who worked with the writing consultants with varying results. The cases demonstrate that the consultant model while useful may also be limiting. Chapter Five, therefore, furnishes a case study demonstrating that the limitations of the consultant model can be overcome by developing collaborative projects that involve the writing consultant and the faculty as partners. Chapter Six concludes the study by reasserting the need for such collaborative projects especially at large research-oriented universities where it may be philosophically impossible to implement centrally administered WAC programs. One-on-one contact between WAC consultants and faculty will serve not only to strengthen WAC efforts of programs and individual faculty but also to make the developing WAC discipline as inclusive as possible for faculty from all disciplines.

Zhou, Joe Y.. (1994). Teaching Revision in the Writing Curriculum of Postsecondary Education. | View Details

This research was conducted to determine the effectiveness of an alternate method of teaching writing Across the curriculum as a means to optimize the writing process at the college level. A pilot study, a pretest and a posttest were administered to gather data. A statistical analysis of the data generated a major conclusion (i.e., the students in the experimental group taught revision skills achieved significantly higher writing scores than those in the control group not taught revision skills). From the statistical analysis of results, five other conclusions can be drawn: (1) The alternate teaching method had the same effect on students in different majors. (2) The alternate teaching method had the same effect on students who had learned revision previously and on those who had not learned revision before. (3) The alternate teaching method had the same effect on students who took one writing course before and on those who took more than one writing course before. (4) The alternate teaching method had the same effect on male students and female students. (5) The alternate teaching method did not make a significant difference in the efficiency of text production for students.

Morgan, Michael E.. (1993). What Is It Like To Write in College: A Phenomenological Study Using in-Depth Interviews. | View Details

This dissertation describes in-depth, using participant's words, experiences of undergraduate college writers. The study was undertaken in an attempt to understand from a student perspective what it is like to write in one's major course of study and throughout the university curriculum. There were seven students, representing different academic majors at a large university. Each were interviewed in a series of three open-ended interviews totaling four and one-half hours. Key questions followed Seidman's (1987) protocol for phenomenological in-depth interviewing: What was writing like for you before college? What is writing like for you now? And, What does your writing mean to you? Interviews were recorded and transcribed verbatim, Three participant's transcripts were edited into profiles of the individual writers while other interviews were used to illumine themes common to all the participants. Insights from this study suggest students are "practitioners" and possess a certain "practitioner-expertise" in being student writers. This practitioner knowledge reveals student experiences are more complex than indicated by previous research. Among these complexities are students' interactions with their instructors, and their own procrastination, which produce tension about writing. Forms of this tension are explored in the histories and current experiences of different students. These experiences indicated that when student writing is perceived as a "task" which must be completed simply to comply with a course requirement, there is a tendency to Approach writing in a formulaic way, with little attention paid to the writing processes. On the other hand, the participants expressed that writing is a positive experience at times when they are consciously aware it has contributed to their learning in a subject- area or when it has aided them in their personal growth. The study indicates writing in college is often shaped by the bureaucratic enterprise of grading and sorting students. Recommendations include making teacher-student interactions consultative and personable, teachers and administrators stronger advocates for smaller class size, and giving students choices of instructional approaches to writing so individual needs as writers are being met in composition courses and Across the curriculum.

Taylor, Marva M.. (1993). Bridging the Gap: Integrating Academic Content in a College Intermediate-Level ESL Course (Integrated Language Arts). | View Details

Recent trends in undergraduate institutions toward establishing general education requirements and writing Across the curriculum have increased the urgency of 'bridging the gap' between skills instruction and content area coursework for ESL students. This study describes one Approach to bridging the gap in an intermediate-level ESL reading course (taught by a cooperating instructor) using the processes and materials designed by the researcher. These included the use of content-area readings drawn from textbooks, newspapers and magazines; integrated reading and writing exercises; a theme-centered course format related to the college's core curriculum; and a class format incorporating individual work, collaborative groups, and a full class forum. Five students were randomly selected and their responses to pre-and-post interviews and questionnaires analyzed to determine their feelings about the bridge Approach and any indications of change or growth; the instructor's responses were similarly analyzed. In addition, the researcher observed class sessions and held conferences with the instructor on a weekly basis. The data gathered regarding the students' and instructor's perceptions indicate a consensus regarding the bridge Approach course's linguistic, academic skills, and affective benefits. The content-area materials were perceived as more difficult but also more interesting and relevant than those used in non-bridge courses, and the theme format as a unifying infrastructure enhancing comprehension of individual texts. In addition, the collaborative group work and integrated exercises were perceived as constituting real communication situations, providing the students with both opportunity and motivation to develop their speaking and listening as well as reading and writing skills. The consensus of students and instructor suggests that the greatest benefits of the bridge Approach course were affective: as students gained practical hands-on experience of what would be required of them in the mainstream curriculum, their confidence and sense of belonging to the college community increased, with a corresponding growth in self-esteem. These outcomes were used as a basis for recommendations for use of the bridge Approach in college ESL programs and for further research.

Garcia-Perez, Grisel M.. (1992). Genre Analysis in Biological Science Texts. | View Details

Douglas Biber (1988) in his book Variation Across Speech and Writing offers a model in which texts can be compared along dimensions of linguistic variation. This is the most sophisticated study on genre differences that has been published so far. The present study presents the results of a search for the percentage of linguistic features specifically shared by texts in the field of biological science. The findings are compared to the general science corpora described in Biber's analyses. The study includes 700-word text samples extracted from larger texts. All texts were automatically included in readable codes for the computer, words were automatically counted, and 10 of the linguistic features (those which most frequently co-occurred in Biber's general science corpora) were automatically identified. After the computational analysis was done, inspection by the analyst of the computer results to check for errors was also mandatory as the program used, AnyTEXT$sp{rm TM},$ did not always recognize all the linguistic features. The frequency counts of linguistic features were normalized to a text length of 1000 words. By summing up the frequency of each of the linguistic features in the texts, I was able to average the factor score for each text Across all texts in the biological science genre and compute a mean dimension score for the genre. I then used this mean dimension score to compare and to specify the relations among three sub-genres: biology, microbiology and biochemistry. The findings of this analysis show that narrowing the corpus to a specific field provides an array of linguistic dimensions which do not necessarily coincide with the results of the general science corpora described in Biber's analysis. (Abstract shortened by UMI.)

Siering, Gregory J.. (1992). Musings on the Muse: Journal Writing Across the Curriculum of Northeast Missouri State University. | View Details

Social constructionist Theories of learning propose that all knowledge is formed through communities' debates over what perceptions and interpretations of the world will be accepted as 'knowledge.' Further, thinking is an internalization of these dialogic debates. Journal writing is a successful pedagogical tool because it allows students to make meaning by 'conversing' with themselves through informal, reflective writing. Journals also draw heavily on schema Theory to promote integration of Theory and practice. Seventy-two instructors at Northeast Missouri State University reported use of journal writing in their teaching. This study examines the use of these journals by discipline. A descriptive analysis reveals fifteen basic functions of journals. The study concludes with practical suggestions for journal use and the application of these functions.

Teranchi, Linda L.. (1992). A Study of an adult Education Program With Emphasis on Writing and Literacy. | View Details

The central purpose of this study was to describe the teaching of writing to adult learners in the General Educational Development (GED) program. The second purpose was to assess the attitudes of both teachers and students about writing, and to describe student progress in writing literacy over time. Participant observation was utilized to collect protocols, and three instruments were distributed to all participants in the study. These instruments included a survey questionnaire, an entry-level diagnostic writing sample and a final writing sample. Numerous formal and informal interviews were conducted with teachers and students to provide clarity, and background information for this multi-dimensional, triangulated qualitative study. The study was conducted at the Lincoln Adult Education Center in Santa Rosa, California. The Lincoln Center was chosen because it was typical of adult education programs. The 49 adults enrolled in the GED program for 1991-1992 were the focus of the study. This included 41 American-born students and 8 International students. The total number of students observed fluctuated over time, due to a high student drop out rate. However, it is estimated that over 100 students participated in this study. The writing curriculum analysis included workbook exercises, writing outlines, essay writing and GED writing practice tests. The writing curriculum was organized and directed by teachers in order to prepare students to take and pass the Writing Skills portion of the GED examination. There was little integration of writing Across the curriculum. It was concluded that: (a) students do attain a higher level of written literacy through their GED preparation for the Writing Skills examination; (b) there is little integration of subject matter in this preparation; (c) computers aid in fostering motivation and writing practice in this preparation; (d) students who have previously been taught to write for a specific purpose, enjoy writing more than students who have not been taught how to write; (e) students who previously have not had direct instruction in writing have a harder time in the preparation process; (f) teachers need to be trained to teach writing as an integrated process.

Young, Linda P.. (1992). College Freshmen Writing Across the Curriculum: A Case Study of Students' Motivations for Revising (Freshman Composition, Revision Strategies). | View Details

This study examined how college freshmen adapt to discipline demands as they write Across the curriculum. By focusing on the revisions students made to two essays written for freshman composition and one paper written for another discipline, I wanted to determine what prompted the students to make revisions and how they compared Across disciplines. Twelve students participated in this study. Case study data included: pre- and post-study questionnaires, report-in tapes made during revising, classification revisions, interviews with the professors, and observation of several composition classes. From the data that comprised the case studies, I categorized the reported motivations as concerns that prompted revision. I next compared the students' motivations for revisions Across the disciplines to determine if the motivations for English papers were similar to or different from the motivations that prompted revision for papers outside English. Results indicated seven concerns that motivated revision in all disciplines: professor influence, desire for clarity, influence of perceived audience, polishing of written product, conformity to perceived discipline standards, and length requirement. Analysis of the students' revisions and the comparison of concerns that motivated revisions Across disciplines suggest that students view revising in all disciplines in much the same way. The nature of the concerns that motivated revision led to surface level revisions and concentration on sections of the text with microstructure level changes rather than macrostructure level changes that would affect the meaning of the total text. This was true for English and classes in other disciplines. of the seven concerns cited, students were primarily concerned with the professor's approval in all disciplines. The English professor influenced revision decisions beyond the English classroom. Professors in other disciplines differed in their expectations for student writing. Students revised less in classes where the professor spent little time in discussion of the papers. Lack of professor involvement seemed to contribute to a reduced level of concern with writing and revising. In summary, students tended to use similar revision strategies Across disciplines. Unfortunately, the revision strategies that were successful in freshman composition did not always produce papers that were considered successful by professors in other disciplines.

Agnew, Eleanor. (1991). Remedial English Ten Years After: Former Basic Writers in the Workplace. | View Details

The purpose of this study was to find out whether writing skills were a handicap to job success for former basic writers who had graduated from college. A population of 197 former basic writers (FBW's) and 68 former strong writers (FSW's, used as a comparison) were surveyed and interviewed. Research questions included (1) What types of jobs do FBW's have, compared to FSW's, and how much do their feelings about writing affect their choices of major or job? (2) How much and how often do FBW's write at work compared to FSW's? (3) What forms of writing do FBW's do most frequently compared to FSW's? (4) How do FBW's feel about the writing they do for their jobs, compared to FSW's? (5) How satisfied are FBW's with their writing ability at work, compared to FSW's? (6) How nervous are FBW's about writing at work, compared to FSW's? (7) If FBW's are writing adequately enough to keep their jobs, how are they able to do this? According to the data from the survey, which yielded a response rate of 68%, FBW's did about the same amount and types of writing as the FSW's, they reported feeling almost as positive about and satisfied with their writing as FSW's, experienced almost as much enjoyment and were not paralyzed with anxiety. Follow-up interviews indicated that FBW's were writing adequately at work and feeling more positive about writing than they had in college because writing requirements were usually short and routine, they had sufficient time to write, they had knowledge of the subject matter, which was focused and predictable, they were familiar with the audiences or their audience needs, sense of purpose was stronger, and the rewards and consequences of writing were more obvious. In addition, FBW's were more mature than in college and had better attitudes and higher motivation. Finally, through work, FBW's had become members of select social and discourse communities. Implications for the teaching profession include writing Across the curriculum, composition courses in the senior year, real life writing assignments, and sequenced writing in class and on final examinations.

Whitis, Judith D.. (1991). A Regional Survey of Writing in Six Subject Areas in Colleges and Universities accredited by the North Central Association of Colleges and Schools (Writing Across the Curriculum). | View Details

This study investigated the nature and frequency of writing tasks undertaken by students in colleges and universities granting bachelor's degrees in institutions accredited by the North Central Association of Colleges and Schools. A sample of seventy-five institutions was drawn, and surveys were mailed to 'good' instructors in six major subjects areas--biology, economics, foreign language, freshman writing, history, and mathematics. The response rate of the survey was 309/450 or 69.0% with each of the six subject areas recording response rates exceeding 60.0%. Questions on the survey were grouped into categories that related to the study's ten research questions: (1) class and instructor characteristics, (2) writing and related activities, (3) reasons for writing, (4) longer writing assignments, (5) intellectual uses of writing, (6) teaching techniques, (7) audiences for student writing, (8) responses to student writing, (9) length of writing assignments, (10) time allowed for writing assignments. The survey also included a section in which respondents answered questions and expressed their views on student writing. Overall, results indicated that writing occurs Across subject areas in colleges, most frequently in the forms of note-taking, discursive writing of a paragraph or longer, and short-answer responses. College instructors stress application of subject area concepts and subject area information more than development of writing skills and personal experience. Informational uses of writing dominate student writing with personal and imaginative uses occurring infrequently. Prewriting, writing and revising, and postwriting techniques are used only sparingly in content classes. College instructors' responses are related to students' thinking processes, accuracy of conclusions, and organization. Subject area instructors accept joint responsibility with freshman writing instructors for teaching students to write, and they feel adequately prepared to do it. Most college instructors have not heard of the writing process movement, but most have heard of the writing Across the curriculum movement. Additional conclusions are drawn and recommendations are made. Results are related to work done by Albert Kitzhaber and Arthur Applebee. Appendices contain information on the Kitzhaber Study, the North Central Association, a population list, a sample list, the survey questionnaire, sample follow-up letters, and a sample codebook. Twenty tables and nineteen figures are included in the text.

Ambron, Joanna T.. (1989). Implementing Writing Across the Curriculum: Strategies in the Biological Sciences. | View Details

This dissertation traces the roots of the writing Across the curriculum (WAC) movement in England and provides a rationale for its implementation in American higher education, especially in our nation's open access community colleges where students exhibit severe deficits in writing. for one of the basic tenets of the WAC movement contends that writing can be employed as a tool for, rather than as a test of, learning in any discipline wherein the student is able use words to make connections and discover meaning. The emphasis exists on the process Approach of writing rather than the product Approach that stresses form and syntactical correctness, not that the WAC movement ignores rules of syntax. Proponents of the writing Across the curriculum movement argue that writing is central to the learning process and that all faculty should endeavor to assist students to communicate concepts with clarity, meaning, and accuracy. The centerpiece of this dissertation presents two published articles from The Journal of College Science Teaching. The first article, entitled 'Writing to Learn Biology', chronicles the author's initial attempts in her Biology classes at Queensborough Community College to implement WAC techniques such as journals, focused on freewriting and microthemes. In this first article the author concludes that these WAC strategies actively engaged students in their own learning. This active involvement resulted in improved student learning. Furthermore, students enjoyed the class more as active rather than passive participants. Encouraged by the positive student response and her own intuition about the efficacy of using WAC techniques to actively engage students the author continued to experiment with interactive classroom strategies that would not only actively engage the learner but also improve scientific literacy. The second article entitled, 'Clustering: An Interactive Technique To Enhance Learning In Biology', describes an innovative pre-writing technique and its implementation in the biology classroom to accomplish these goals. The conclusion of the dissertation includes: (1) a research paradigm for analyzing students summary writing; (2) student feedback on the learning process and implications for future practice; and (3) reflections by the author on her sense of development and professional renewal vis-a-vis faculty development within the City University of New York and at Teachers College, Columbia University.

Castaldi, Teresa M.. (1989). Writing Across the Curriculum: An Ethnographic Study of Nontraditional Students in an Undergraduate History Class. | View Details

The data obtained from this investigation which focused on the writing produced in a non-traditional, undergraduate U.S. Labor History class indicate that most of the writing in this class centered on informational and mechanical uses of writing, i.e., copying from the blackboard and note-taking. Although the instructor recognized the value of writing within a course curriculum, reading assignments and studying for exams dominated homework exercises. The ethnographic paradigm, however, produced a much more comprehensive picture of the class which suggests that various activities including note-taking, reorganizing notes, reading related and assigned class materials, class discussion, listening to lectures and reading and writing on the job can positively influence the learning of course material and the form writing takes in a class. This method also allowed a clearer image of the non-traditional student population, i.e., blue collar workers, to emerge. First, as older working class students, life experience became the mediating channel between the course content and the development of writing skills. Second, each student was at a different level of development and experience in their academic career which had an effect upon the writing they produced, i.e., the more schooling an individual had, the more sophisticated a student he became. Third, those students who were involved in academic pursuits for the first time or after a long hiatus actively drew upon relevant past experiences in order to construct a viable model which was used to process new information. Thus, several students used their 'workaday' reading and writing activities as a structure for their own class writing. Finally, adult learners do not carve up their lives into separate spheres: A definite overlap exists between the domains of school, work and home. Sometimes success in writing is dependent upon the types of reading and writing students are exposed to at their places of employment; if the writing models presented to them at work were unsuitable templates for school work, students had difficulty with their class writing.

Swilky, Jody. (1989). Competing Approaches to Literacy Instruction: An Examination of Arguments for Writing in the Disciplines. | View Details

Articles and textbooks devoted to writing Across the curriculum evidence general agreement among composition Theorists concerning the value of this educational concept. At the same time, Theorists express disagreement about the uses of writing and the purpose of instruction. This literacy debate is presently dominated by two arguments. Formalists contend that writing should serve as a means of disciplinary socialization, and their pedagogical prescriptions emphasize systematic instruction in learning generic rules and the conventions of discourse. By contrast, epistemic Theorists underscore the heuristic potential of language use, and they frequently recommend informal writing activities that allow students to learn the concepts and forms of inquiry that pertain to a discipline. Despite these contrastive concerns, formalist and epistemic arguments fail to promote literacy as an activity through which students develop critical consciousness of social reality and work toward affecting the conditions of their lives. This work expands the debate over writing in disciplinary courses. It advocates a sociological argument for literacy instruction which contends that students learn and become empowered by scrutinizing the social reality that surrounds them. Through the investigation of self, society and academic discourse, students develop dialectical reasoning and critical thinking. From this sociological perspective, reading and writing help students become critically conscious of their relationship to the social reality that conditions them, so they can participate more self-consciously, and perhaps more freely, in the educational process and larger social order. The controversy over the use of writing in disciplinary courses is a dispute over the purpose of schooling. The issues being debated are the methods by which students should learn, the degree to which they should participate in the educational process, and the values and the attitudes they should encounter in the classroom. This work examines approaches to literacy in relationship to the educational Theory and the rhetorical traditions that inform these contemporary practices, illuminating the educational and social value of the sociological position as well as the ideological and purposive limitations of other arguments.

Gibson, Sharon S.. (1988). Classroom Communities and Global Coherence: A Sociocognitive Model for Composition Theory, Pedagogy, and Research. | View Details

Both cognitive and social constructionist models of composing must guide pedagogy and research in the composition discipline. A sociocognitive synthesis of these complementary (not competing as Kenneth Bruffee would assert) models derived from the original cognitive Theories of Jean Piaget, Lev Vygotsky, and Jerome Bruner serves as a useful foundation for a collaborative problem-solving Approach to teaching writing Across the curriculum. The sociocognitive model, based on Piaget's model of the equilibration of cognitive structures and several Theories of concept formation, explains the importance of idiosyncratic mixes of knowledge constructs (conceptual hierarchies or networks) held by each individual. While knowledge is socially constructed in communities, each individual belongs to many overlapping communities in a pluralistic modern world. Piaget's model of assimilation and accommodation acknowledges the interaction of individual abstraction processes with the knowledge-making processes of discourse communities. Models of memory and internalization from cognitive Theory expand Piaget's model to help define the relationships between writing and thinking. In addition, research based on social constructionist assumptions and methods helps map the role of community conversations in the construction of specific texts. Looking at student texts in an experimental sociocognitive class from these perspectives combined with methods of literary criticism and text linguistics can provide a more complete Approach to study of the interactions of individuals and communities as they are represented in texts. A combination of three research orientations--ethnographic, cognitive, and textual--offers new insights into the ways communities evolve and elaborate abstract concepts, into the role of cognitive dissonance in knowledge-making processes, and into the relationship between community problem-solving as a collaborative composition pedagogy and the shaping of individual student texts. The linguists' concept of global coherence provides a focus for analyzing this research which seeks to determine how textual elements signal community conversations and shared knowledge. Global coherence, an interaction of texts and contexts, is a suitable object for sociocognitive research agendas, one which illustrates the explanatory power of the sociocognitive model of composing and confirms the value of a pedagogy centered on classroom communities which treat writing as part of the students' ongoing conversation with each other, shared texts, and their instructors.

Saye, Jr., Edward L.. (1988). The Behaviors and Attitudes of the Teachers of Academic Subjects at Dunwoody High School Toward the Teaching of Composition (Georgia). | View Details

Purpose. The purpose of this study was to establish the current state of the behaviors and attitudes of the teachers of English, foreign languages, mathematics, science, and social studies toward the teaching of composition at Dunwoody High School, in anticipation of establishing a writing Across the curriculum program. Methods and procedures. The methods and procedure used consisted of giving comparable surveys to the teachers in these departments and to the students in classes selected by the teachers. The surveys asked about the purposes for writing, the nature of prewriting activities, the kind and number of writing tasks undertaken, the techniques of instruction, the system of evaluation used, and related matters. A conception of the writing instruction that went on in the classes could be inferred from the information obtained. Results. The teacher and student surveys were compared. The results showed that students generally saw less of the practices usually associated with composition instruction going on in their classes than the teachers did and that the teachers themselves saw little enough. of the seven factors studied, teachers in the all-faculty group and their students agreed that low use was made of items listed under Goals for Composing Instruction, Content, and Evaluation. Students and teachers agreed that extremely low use was made of items under Writing Tasks, Audience, and Publication and Display. Teachers saw low use, while students saw extremely low use of Writing Tasks. Conclusions. The conclusions arrived at are that both the philosophical and pedagogical areas of Dunwoody's composition programs are in need of improvement at present. Philosophically, Dunwoody teachers apparently see themselves almost exclusively as evaluators of student writing and spend very little time helping students learn to write. Pedagogically, many roads to improvement could be taken. The three most practical, manageable, and promising of success would be working harder on prewriting activities, stressing strategies of editing and revising, and providing for the publication or display of student work. These are promising, inexpensive places to begin improving. Dunwoody should adopt writing Across the curriculum as a tool to help students write better and to learn more of the subject matter about which they write.

Lovejoy, Kim B.. (1987). A Model for the Analysis of Cohesion and Information Management in Published Writing in Three Disciplines. | View Details

This study proposes a model to compare cohesion and information management in samples of professional writing in three disciplines (counseling psychology, biology, and history). When tested with the chi-square procedure, the comparisons revealed significant differences in the cohesion and information management systems of the three sample passages (criterion: p $

Mitchell, Felicia. (1987). Writing Assignments Across the Curriculum: A Study of Faculty Interpretation of a University-Wide Writing Requirement. | View Details

'Writing Across the curriculum' was defined as a systematic attempt to introduce students to a wider variety of the aims of discourse, a variety which can invite them to look at new subjects from different perspectives. In addition, the researcher hypothesized that one of the roles of a teacher introducing writing into a content area is to engage students in productive writing experiences via clear and purposeful writing assignments. The study that followed, which described a decentralized university-wide writing requirement, was based on attitudes and practices of university instructors teaching writing as a substantial component of courses in the content areas at The University of Texas at Austin. Research methods included a questionnaire survey and content analyses of instructors' syllabi, writing assignments, students' writing samples, and teachers' comments on student writing. Thirty-five faculty members from 21 departments of nine of the ten colleges and schools offering 'substantial writing component' courses in the fall of 1986 participated after an initial stratified random selection of the sample; the sample was differentiated by degree of preparation for teaching writing. Both the survey and the content analyses were described statistically. Syllabi were examined for references to writing and the integration of writing assignments Across the semester. Assignments were analyzed for explicit and implicit content cues categorized under four dimensions: rhetorical, instructional, cognitive, and general (i.e.) nature and language of the assignment). Analysis of writing samples tied the importance of assignment dimensions to instructors' evaluations. Comments analysis revealed the frequency of comments by type (rhetorical, instructional, cognitive, and general assignment specifications). The researcher concluded that there was a wide interpretation of the writing requirement. However, writing was found to be used as a method of learning even by instructors who had not been trained in writing Across the curriculum. Faculty were more likely to share attitudes but disagree on instructional strategies. Assignment analysis revealed, in part, a range of specific tasks; discourse aims were generally referential. The researcher cited lack of consistent faculty development and decentralized administration as reasons for the wide interpretation. Implications for faculty development in writing Across the curriculum were noted.

Davis, David J.. (1985). Writing Across the Curriculum: Attitudes and Practices of Selected Faculty. | View Details

This study explicates the attitudes and practices toward student writing of a group of eight faculty members, each representing a different liberal arts discipline and each using writing extensively in undergraduate courses. Their attitudes and practices are related to eight major assumptions of the writing Across the curriculum movement as derived from a review of the literature. These eight faculty informants were interviewed an average of three times over the course of an entire semester. In addition, their classroom activities related to student writing were periodically observed and course documents (syllabi, handouts, examinations, and graded student papers) were analyzed. Several common themes emerged from analysis of the interview transcripts, observation notes, and documents. These teachers felt that writing is the responsibility of faculty in all disciplines and that writing is a tool for thinking and learning as well as a necessary communication skill. There was a wide diversity in the types of writing they assigned, in the real or assumed audiences, and in the pedagogical purposes their assignments served. Virtually all assigned writing was in the transactional mode. Half were unwilling to devote significant class time to writing-related activities, despite the importance their comments gave to student writing. None felt their efforts to encourage student writing were recognized by their colleagues or rewarded or supported by the University. Nor did they feel that other faculty shared their commitment to good teaching and student writing. Most felt that freshman writing classes need to be more concerned with preparing students to write within the specific conventions of different disciplines, and called for greater cooperation between writing teachers and content-area teachers. They also felt that the administration must make a strong commitment to student writing and to rewarding good teaching if the current situation is to change. Finally, most felt that participating in the study itself was beneficial to them, and several reported making substantive changes in their practices as a result of their dialogues with the researcher.

McCarthy, Lucille P.. (1985). A Stranger in Strange Lands: A College Student Writing Across the Curriculum (Rhetoric, Composition, Education). | View Details

This study asks questions about the nature of writing processes in classrooms. More specifically, how do students go into a classroom setting and figure out what the writing requirements are in that discipline and for that teacher, and how do they go about producing it? As students go from one classroom to another, they are presented with new speech situations, and they must determine what constitutes appropriate ways of speaking and writing in each new territory. How do they learn the rules for successful written communication in a particular classroom, rules which include many conventions and presuppositions that are not explicitly articulated? In order to answer these questions this study examines the writing experiences of three Loyola College students during their freshman, sophomore, and junior years. It focuses primarily on one of these students as he wrote in three consecutive semesters for Freshman Composition and his sophomore courses, Introduction to Poetry and Cell Biology. Follow-up data was collected during the fall of his junior year. Three research methods were combined in order to get as full a picture as possible of this student writer's experiences in the various classroom contexts. These research methods are ethnographic observation and interviews, composing-aloud protocols, and text analysis. Conclusions are drawn from the data about how this Loyola student figured out what constituted acceptable writing in each classroom and how he worked to produce it. Also presented are conclusions about what enhanced or denied his success in communicating competently in unfamiliar academic territories. Affecting his success were unarticulated social aspects of classroom contexts for writing as well as explicitly stated requirements and instructions. Conclusions are also drawn from the data about how this student's writing experiences in the various contexts related to each other, particularly how Freshman Composition related to his sophomore academic writing experiences. Implications from the data and conclusions are suggested (1) for students' writing development, (2) for the teaching of writing, and (3) for liberal arts education in general.

Obler, Susan S.. (1985). Writing Across the Curriculum Practices of Full-Time Faculty in Selected Community Colleges (Two-Year, California). | View Details

The decline of basic literacy in community college students has resulted in serious questions about the full-time faculty's role in providing writing practice Across the curriculum. The purpose of this study is to describe the practices and values of the full-time faculty, and to describe their views about the barriers and incentives to writing requirements. The data were gathered by two methods. First, surveys of 304 full-time faculty were gathered from four California community colleges; secondly, personal interviews were conducted with a random sample of 20 of the survey respondents. The major findings of the study focus upon how much and what kinds of writing activities were required by full-time faculty, in what areas or departments these activities occurred, what influences were in the instructors' background, and what was administrative support for these activities. In some data analyses, Composition and/or English departments were omitted to avoid distortion of results. About one third of the sample assigned formal papers; about two thirds assigned informal papers. There was a significant relationship between department orientation and formal and informal papers. Students' career goals and teaching experience were the primary influence on the methods instructors used to evaluate mastery. There was a significant relationship between the instructors' writing confidence, their writing practice and writing required. Where administrative support or college policy existed, faculty were more involved with using writing. Major barriers to writing were student resistance, discomfort with evaluating writing, and competing content or skills. Class size was not the barrier to writing that might be expected. As the literature suggests, there was limited appreciation of the importance of writing as a learning tool and of shared responsibility for providing writing practice. Writing proficiency appears to be a luxury that competes with other priorities.

Hanrahan, Calvin M.. (1984). A Comparison of Two Approaches to Using Writing Across the Curriculum. | View Details

Because of recent emphasis upon the process of writing, rather than the product of writing, educators see writing not only as a means of communicating knowledge, but also as a part of the acquisition of knowledge. What is not yet clear is whether writing about a discipline other than English should be an integral part of the English composition class, dual subject Approach, or whether writing about a discipline should be conducted within the discipline, single subject Approach (Kinneavy, 1983). Over a two-year period, writing samples, writing attitude surveys, and final grades in a history class were collected to determine which of the two approaches to writing about and within a discipline are effective in improving quality of writing, changing attitude toward writing, and enhancing learning. One group had a dual class program in which World Civilization content served as the reading content for the English class, and the students' writing assignments were about the World Civilization content. A second group had a single class program in which the content and writing assignments in the English class were the same as in all of the English classes at the college. The World Civilization class was the same for both groups; the students wrote more within the discipline under the direction of a professor who had received training at two writing Across the curriculum workshops. The English professor received the same training. Pre-writing and post-writing samples and pre-writing attitude and post-writing attitude surveys were taken from each group as well as final exam grades in the World Civilization courses. The writing samples and attitude surveys were scored, and t-tests were used to determine differences between pre- and post-writing samples and pre- and post-attitude surveys. Pearson product-moment correlations were used to determine relationships between post-writing samples and post-attitude surveys and between post-writing samples and final World Civilization grades. There were no significant differences in the pre-writing and post-writing samples of both the dual subject group and the single subject group. There were significant differences in the pre-writing attitude and post-writing attitude surveys of the dual subject group, but there were no significant differences in the pre-writing attitude and post-writing attitude surveys of the single subject group. There was no significant correlation between post-writing samples and post-writing attitude surveys for both groups, and there was no significant correlation between post-writing samples and final exam grades in World Civilization for both groups.

Dunn, Robert F.. (1983). The Design, Implementation, and Evaluation of a Writing - Across - the - Curriculum Program at a Small Liberal arts University: A Case Study. | View Details

This is a case study of educational problem solving which subsumes two closely related problems--one educational, the other research. (1) The educational problem: how can faculty work together to improve the writing and learning of all students at the university? (2) The research problem: what processes were used in solving the educational problem? To what extent were they effective? What can we learn from analysis of these processes about effecting change among a university faculty? Solution to the educational problem was sought through faculty workshops, which were perceived by the researcher as the best means for gaining collegial collaboration--the sine qua non of writing Across the curriculum programs. Two principal Theories underlay all workshop and related activities: (1) a cognitive Theory of writing, i.e., a Theory of writing as a mode of learning, and (2) a process Theory of educational change, in this case, a Theory based on social interaction in a five-stage model of exploration, strategic planning, initiation, implementation, and incorporation. Solution to the research problem was sought through methodological processes of observation, monitoring, assessing, evaluating, and reflective analysis. Data were gathered from surveys, interviews, letters, memoranda, researcher's log, etc. Based on data analysis, the study reports changes in faculty attitudes towards writing as a mode of learning and changes in four important areas of instructional practice: (1) course requirements, (2) writing assignments, (3) classroom strategies, and (4) responses to papers. These curricular, pedagogical, and attitudinal changes are interpreted as positive signs of movement towards institutionalization of a writing Across the curriculum program.

Harley, Katherine H.. (1981). Theory and Practice of Writing Across the Curriculum: Humanities/Composition Link at Saginaw Valley State College, 1977-1980. | View Details

Writing Across the Curriculum and Discipline-Based Writing programs represent attempts to involve students in more writing in all their classes and to link that writing to what students are learning in subject areas other than English. These programs rest on certain Theories about the nature of the writing process and the relationship between writing and learning which suggest that writing can be an important vehicle for discovering and formulating ideas for the self, as well as providing the means through which ideas are communicated to an audience. Writing can be central to learning. Therefore, all teachers should use writing to promote effective learning of their disciplines. Since 1965, many Writing Across the Curriculum and Discipline-Based Writing programs have been implemented, based on the following assumptions: writing is not the concern solely of the English department; linking writing with other learning improves motivation; in order to learn to write, students must have something to write about; writing growth is fostered when writing is done to understand a subject; writing should be seen as a process; writing is learned above all by writing, so reinforcement and practice are essential. A Discipline-Based Writing course has been developed and taught at Saginaw Valley State College between 1977 and 1980. Called LINK, the program joins freshmen courses in Humanities and composition, leading to student improvement both in writing skills and in mastery of course content. Specifically, the LINK program has helped students to develop motivation and confidence for writing; to use writing to discover ideas and to forge bonds between the self and the material studied; to develop reading skills; to develop abstractive abilities and the ability to summarize; to transform ideas effectively for an audience; to write for a variety of audiences; and to gain an understanding of, and control over, writing processes.

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