Tips for Writers Who Have to Teach a Writing Class   

Even the most confident writers may panic when they are asked to teach a writing class for their company. Ensure success with this basic tenet of adult education: Teach what the learners want to know. The second tenet follows: Don't teach any more than the learners need to know. Focus on three to five writing problems you see within your company. Use a 'teach and do' method: Teach a topic, such as passive voice, then do an exercise to practice what you have just taught. Adults like hands-on writing experience, and they like to work as teams to analyze problematic writing. Provide handouts that participants can use later, and include resources for future reference. Get evaluations from the participants so that you can improve with each subsequent workshop. And don't forget to order the donuts!

Moore, Susan B. STC Proceedings (1999). Articles>Education>Writing>Technical Writing

Topic-Raising in Tutoring Sessions Involving Writing Tutors and Engineering Students  

The paper examines whether writing tutors control the subject matter discussed in tutoring sessions with engineering students, topic-raising in six tutoring sessions was analyzed. Over 81% of the topics were raised by tutors, suggesting tutors control subject matter. To examine the subject matter that tutors and students focused upon, topics were categorized by type. Over 55% of the topics raised were related to sentence clarity, conciseness, and mechanics. Tutors and students also raised topics related to content, rhetorical situation, and textual organization and formatting. Writing tutors and engineering students focus on sentence-level issues even though students might benefit from more attention to discourse-level issues.

Mackiewicz, Jo M. Association for Business Communication (2004). Articles>Education>Writing>Engineering

Toward a Post-Techne-Or, Inventing Pedagogies for Professional Writing    

This article examines the concept of techne in relation to situatedness. Techne is conceived as techniques for situating bodies in contexts. Although many theorists and practitioners in technical communication are working from ecological and posthuman perspectives with regard to interface designs, this article argues for extending those perspectives to workplace and classroom situations. Starting from a Heideggerian reading of techne, the article moves toward the concept of post-techne, which remakes pedagogical techniques for writing and inventing in institutional contexts.

Hawk, Byron. Technical Communication Quarterly (2004). Articles>Education>Writing>Technical Writing

Training for Wannabe Technical Writers

'More technical writers. Better technical writers.' This is the mantra I have in mind while I write this column.

Kamath, Gurudutt R. IT People (2003). Articles>Education>Technical Writing>India

Transition: Technical Writer to Technical Writing Teacher

The transition from being a technical writer to becoming a Visiting Professor of Technical Communication has meant, so far, that 1) I work a whole lot more, and 2) I finally have a chance to see the effect of the things that we create on the user. My students have helped me to do this.

Johnson, Carol Siri. MetroVoice (2002). Articles>Education>Writing>Technical Writing

Traveling in Space and Time: A Study of Learning Trajectories in Student Acquisition of Engineering Communication Strategies

My preliminary studies have shown that students do indeed acquire basic communication strategies appropriate for their chosen field that help them to become acculturated in workplace contexts. In other words, they begin to genre their 'way through social interactions, choosing the correct form in response to each communicative situation [they] encounter,' which they do 'with varying degree of mastery'. The subject of my CCCC 2003 presentation is a series of events that occurred in the life of one of my longitudinal study participants. In the presentation, I related these events to the audience and then analyzed them using Rhetorical Genre Studies as a theoretical tool.

Artemeva, Natasha. Newsletter of the CASLL (2003). Articles>Education>Engineering>Writing

Understanding and Reducing the Knowledge Effect: Implications for Writers    

To be effective, writers must understand what knowledge they share with the audience and what they do not. Achieving this understanding is made difficult by the knowledge effect--a tendency of individuals to assume that their own knowledge is shared by others. Understanding the knowledge effect and methods for reducing it is potentially useful for understanding and teaching writing. In Study 1, we explored the impact of an individual's knowledge of technical terms on that person's ability to estimate other people's understanding of those terms. We assessed how individuals' familiarity with technical terms influenced their predictions that college freshmen and college graduates would understand those terms. Results indicate that familiarity with the meaning of technical terms leads to substantial overestimation of others' knowledge. In Study 2, we evaluated an online tutor designed to improve writers' predictions of other's word knowledge by providing them with feedback on the accuracy of their judgments.

Hayes, John R. and Diana Bajzek. Written Communication (2008). Articles>Education>Rhetoric>Writing

Using "Community" Needs to Promote and Expand WAC      

We know that many WAC initiatives start as grassroots efforts to meet local curricular needs, and that success depends on the extent to which these initiatives gain institutional support. However, as the missions of institutions change to account more fully for preparing students for their roles as citizens and workers, WAC initiatives need to be more aware of the needs of the larger community as well as the university community.

Blalock, Glenn, Susan Loudermilk, Diana Cardenas and Joyce Hawthorne. LLAD (2002). Articles>Education>Writing

Using Customer Loyalty as a Platform for Teaching Written, Oral, and Team-Based Business Communication  

For many students, their role as customers is their most significant interface with the business world. They understand, at some level, the organizational importance of building customer loyalty for the success of companies. Building on that understanding can provide a context that amplifies their knowledge of business and reinforces the value of effective communication. Using the organizational goal of building customer loyalty as a framework for class discussion and activities gives instructors a real-world rationale that brings the world of business into communication courses. This fresh approach shows you ways to focus student writing, presentations, and group process assignments around the theme of evaluating and improving customer loyalty.

Timm, Paul R. Association for Business Communication (2004). Articles>Education>Writing>Collaboration

Using Humor in the Technical Writing Classroom    

Humor in the classroom is about engagement and involvement. Learn some new techniques to use and when to tread carefully.

Campbell, Alexa. Intercom (2008). Articles>Education>Writing>Technical Writing

Using the Web in the Writing Classroom: A Preliminary Study  

Popular opinion maintains that people should be able to locate, collect, and evaluate information on the world-wide web without any substantial instruction. To test this premise eighty students at four disciplinary divergent schools participated in a study to evaluate their performance in retrieving and assessing electronic information. While the author is willing to admit that changes in performance are likely to occur over time, the present study found students (and by extension employee) performance to be relatively poor.

Rubens, Philip. STC Proceedings (1998). Articles>Education>Web Design>Writing

WAC in an Urban and Bilingual Setting: Writing-to-Learn in English y en Español      

Responding to a 1999 City University of New York (CUNY) Board of Trustees resolution mandating a five-year university-wide WAC Initiative, Hostos Community College/CUNY, an urban, bilingual community college with a predominantly Spanish-speaking, low-income student population, has established a comprehensive WAC program. The Hostos Initiative reflects the University-wide philosophy that writing ability is developed through extensive writing practice across a broad range of academic experiences at all levels of a student's academic life and draws on research which illustrates the interrelationship between language and learning (Barnes, et al., Britton, Emig, Martin et al.).

Hirsch, Linda. LLAD (2002). Articles>Education>Writing

WAC Meets TAC: WebCT Bulletin Boards as a Writing to Learn Technique  

Fall of 2000 seemed like the right time to introduce more technology into my undergraduate course Applied Child Development. Several forces came together to lead me to this decision. NCATE had encouraged teacher preparation courses to make more use of technology. The friendly folks at Information Technology Services were offering summer workshops on introducing WebCT into classes. The Computer Advisory Board (CAB) or the Technology Across the Curriculum (TAC) group—I’ve forgotten which, and I’m not sure I know the difference—was offering bribes, I mean honoraria, to people to make such innovations. And I was recovering from the experience of trying to teach the quietest group of students I’d ever encountered in one classroom, a group I had come to affectionately refer to as 'mime school.'

Miller, Robert S. WAC Journal, The (2002). Articles>Education>Writing Across the Curriculum>Online

What Leadership, Goals, and Policies Can Ensure that Students Communicate Well in Multicultural Environments and International Commerce?      

The five panelists addressed this very large question from different points of view and different areas of expertise. In general, however, they endorsed, in Schneider's term, an approach to intercultural learning that supports 'a vision of civic responsibility in a diverse and still deeply unequal world.' This summary captures some of the issues raised in the discussion and suggestions for addressing these issues.

Andrews, Deborah C., Rebecca E. Burnett, Daniel Chavez, Jonathan Monroe and Neal Lane. LLAD (2002). Articles>Education>Writing

What Matters Who Writes? What Matters Who Responds? Issues of Ownership in the Writing Classroom  

This text was originally constructed as a keynote address for the NCTE conference held August 10-12, 1995 at Colgate University and was delivered under the same title. Some text has been changed to accomodate hypertextual publication. To follow the text nearly as it was delivered August 11, click the link labelled 'Next' at the bottom of each 'page.' However, following the text in this manner defeats the purpose of this hypertextual presentation. Explore the structure of the text -- you may find yourself rewarded with your own unique reading experience. There are conceptual links to themes that run through the text (Postmodern (un)grounding, Collaboration, Copy(w)right/Ownership, and Possible Futures ), and navagational links ( Next, Previous, and Back ) which should provide you with many reading possibilities.

Lunsford, Andrea A., Rebecca Rickly, Michael J. Salvo and Susan West. Kairos (1996). Articles>Education>Writing

What Must Be Done to Ensure That College Students Communicate Well in Their Fields?      

With the turn of a new century, it seems as though everyone has gone into the forecasting business--especially stockbrokers and academics. Our own field has marked the emerging era with a wonderful essay collection, WAC for the New Millennium (ed. McLeod, et al., NCTE 2001). In the same spirit, this panel looked to the future by reflecting on best current theory/practice (guided by the stockbrokers' caution that past performance is no guarantee of future results.) To set the stage for the discussion, the moderator briefly considered the title assigned by the conference organizers: 'What Must Be Done to Ensure That College Students Communicate Well in Their Fields?'

Youra, Steven. LLAD (2002). Articles>Education>Writing>Workplace

What Technical Writing Students Should Know About Typeface Personality    

Typeface personality impacts the rhetorical effect of students' documents, yet it receives little attention in textbooks. Technical writing students should stand the definition of "appropriate" in relation to typeface selection, the difference between type's functional and semantic properties, the difference between type family and personality, the effect of a typeface's history, and the contribution of a typeface's anatomy to its personality. Understanding these, students can make informed decisions about typeface appropriateness.

Mackiewicz, Jo M. Journal of Technical Writing and Communication (2004). Articles>Education>Typography>Technical Writing

"Who are You, and What is It You Do Again?": Struggling for Identity in Small Technical Communication Programs  

Technical writing faculty who work in solo situations are often seen as the 'other' in their home departments, whether we are housed with literature, business, or engineering faculty. We are thus inscribed in a unique border location, and consequently are further inscribed in a peripheral location within the greater technical writing academy.

Nardone, Carroll Ferguson. CPTSC Proceedings (2003). Articles>Education>Writing>Technical Writing

Why Teach Digital Writing?  

This webtext 'talks' in all the ways we are asked to talk about teaching digital writing: in the hallways to colleagues, in policy documents to administrators, in classroom exercises to graduate and undergraduate students, and to colleagues at conferences, in journal articles, and other scholarly genres.

Kairos (2005). Articles>Education>Writing>Online

Why Teach Digital Writing?

Computers are not 'just tools' for writing. Networked computers create a new kind of writing space that changes the writing process and the basic rhetorical dynamic between writers and readers. Computer technologies have changed the processes, products, and contexts for writing in dramatic ways—and writing instruction needs to change to suit how writing is produced in digital spaces.

Cushman, Ellen, Danielle DeVoss, Jeffrey T. Grabill, Bill Hart-Davidson and Jim Porter. WIDE Research Center (2005). Articles>Education>Writing>Online

The Writer as Trainer: How to Transfer Your Skills and Empower Others Without Losing Your Job  

Technical writing may be seen as a marginal activity without clear economic benefit to an organization. Yet writing and editing can be tied to an organization's bottom line. Writers can use training and other interventions to demonstrate their own effectiveness. Such interventions can raise the efficiency with which their organizations produce documents and improve the quality of the documents themselves. Customer-oriented organizations will be most receptive to these interventions, but even unreceptive organizations can change their practices. Successful interventions require working with others and will mean added responsibilities for the writer.

Moody, Helen. STC Proceedings (1993). Articles>Education>Writing>Technical Writing

Writing Across the Curriculum in International Contexts: An Introduction    

As is the case with the first-year composition class, we tend to think of WAC programs as an exclusively U.S. phenomenon, or at least a North American phenomenon.

McLeod, Susan H. LLAD (2001). Articles>Education>Writing Across the Curriculum>International

Writing Centers and Academic Advising: Towards a Synergistic Partnership

When considering forms of academic writing and, more broadly, the kinds of advice academic writing centers provide students, we usually think about academic communication, disciplinary forms of writing research reports, pedagogical approaches, and perhaps, on a good day, providing students with assistance on making presentations at academic conferences. Unfortunately, student mentoring, in the form of academic and professional advising, is rarely considered as a potential outcome or role of an active writing center. This article introduces academic advising as an important and useful role academic writing centers can fulfill. Academic advising can not only influence students' academic and career choices but can also play a critical role in creating and facilitating a productive academic culture within a departmental and university-wide context.

Faber, Brenton D. and Catherine Avadikian. Academic.Writing (2002). Articles>Education>Writing

Writing for the Pre-Professional Within a Liberal Arts Curriculum  

Believing that writing instruction beyond the basics of composition is an integral part of a liberal education but realizing that students are increasingly turning to career-oriented electives which will help them secure employment upon graduation, I developed an advanced writing class that would link liberal arts education and professional training. The course is entitled “Writing for the Pre-professional.”

Palumbo, Roberta M. JAC (1980). Articles>Education>Writing

Writing To Learn To Do: WAC, WAW, WAW, Wow!  

I've heard lots of reasons offered for the surprising success of WAC over the last 27 years. But you know, the I think it's the acronym. WAC. Have you ever had colleagues good naturedly kid about the acronym. 'This is WACy!' There is something a little crazy about this whole thing.

Russell, David R. LLAD (1994). Articles>Education>Writing Across the Curriculum