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Supporting Students To Craft Specific, Complex, And Nuanced Thesis Statements, Ruth Li

Journal of Response to Writing

In this teaching tip, I introduce an exercise that engages students in offering feedback on their peers' in-progress thesis statements. The exercise encourages students' critical awareness of their own and others' writerly choices.

Quotations Of The Sealed Portions Of The Book Of Mormon, John Gee

Insights: The Newsletter of the Neal A. Maxwell Institute for Religious Scholarship

What we have of Jesus’s ministry to the Nephites is an abridged version because the Lord wished to “try the faith of [his] people” (3 Nephi 26:6–13). Dutiful to his charge, Mormon did not provide a full account of Jesus’s teachings, but his son Moroni provided three quotations of portions that his father did not.

2 Nephi 26 And 27 As Midrash, Grant Hardy

Insights: The Newsletter of the Neal A. Maxwell Institute for Religious Scholarship

Nephi was the only Book of Mormon author to receive what might be called a classical Hebrew education. He had ambivalent feelings about his training—indeed, he specifically noted that the tradition would end with himself: “I . . . have not taught my children after the manner of the Jews” (2 Nephi 25:6; see vv. 1–2). So it is not surprising that he remains the most literate, book-learned of the Nephite prophets. That is to say, his writings exhibit the most connections with earlier prophecies and texts, and he structures his teachings in a way that suggests he is working …

Using The “Card” Response Technique To Assist Middle School Students In The Revision Process, Katherine E. Batchelor

Journal of Response to Writing

Although revision is essential to the writing process, it is often neglected in schools. However, when revision is taught successfully, through reflection, conferencing, positive teacher feedback, specific instruction linked to reading strategies, and time between drafts in order for students to think about their writing (including the expectation of multiple drafts), students not only revise more, but at a deeper level. This study investigates how middle school students’ writing drafts as well as attitudes and beliefs toward revision changed based on introducing a specific revision strategy called the CARD response technique, which is both a self-response and peer-response strategy. CARD …

Improving First- And Second-Year Student Writing Using A Metacognitive And Integrated Assessment Approach, Leanne Havis

Journal of Response to Writing

Metacognition emphasizes an awareness and understanding of one’s thought and cognitive processes, along with management of cognition through multiple strategies including organizing, monitoring, and adapting. Before students can truly become effective writers, they must develop an appreciation for the amount of planning, organization, and revision that comprises a writing assignment. In order to improve student writing, the exam autopsy approach, an integrated post-exam assessment model that draws upon self-assessment, peer review, and instructor feedback, was modified to include metacognitive components for use with essay exams and writing assignments. The current study employed a mixed-methods design with a quasi-experimental, non-equivalent group …

Nibley Magnum Opus To Be Released Soon

Insights: The Newsletter of the Neal A. Maxwell Institute for Religious Scholarship

Hugh Nibley’s long-anticipated One Eternal Round is in the final stages of production. This volume represents the culmination of Nibley’s thoughts and research on the Book of Abraham, especially Facsimile 2.

Early Book Of Mormon Writings Now Online

Insights: The Newsletter of the Neal A. Maxwell Institute for Religious Scholarship

The most extensive collection of writings about the Book of Mormon published between 1829 and 1844 has been made available as an online database. The collection, 19th-Century Publications about the Book of Mormon (1829–1844), includes nearly 600 publications and close to one million words of text. It is intended to comprise, insofar as possible, everything published during Joseph Smith’s lifetime relating to the Book of Mormon. Under the auspices of Digital Collections at Brigham Young University’s Harold B. Lee Library, this ambitious project can be accessed at lib.byu.edu/dlib/bompublications.

My Very Favorite Book In The Whole World, Amanda Morgan

Children's Book and Media Review

No matter how many he tries to read, Henly just isn’t interested in books. Some are too big, others are too boring, and they are just not related to what he wants to be doing or who he is. Then one day, he gets the hardest assignment: to present his favorite book to the class. Henly tries asking for help, but there is still nothing interesting in the library or the bookstore. Finally, his mom’s advice gives him a wonderful idea, and with a little thinking outside the box, Henly creates his favorite book in the whole wide world.

Before They Were Authors: Famous Writers As Kids, Maryn Wheeler

Children's Book and Media Review

Discover how life creates a writer in this picture book biography of ten well-known authors. Beginning with a watercolor portrait, timeline, and a beloved passage from one of his or her books, the narratives highlight notable life and world events that inspired or influenced the author’s writing journey. Also included are quotes and advice these authors offer to future writers.

Writing!, Katherine Cooper

Children's Book and Media Review

People use language to communicate, to share what is in their mind or heart. Writing is the symbol of language. With just 26 letters rearranged in different ways, an endless possibility of words can be formed. In order for writing to be understood by others, it needs to be done well. Otherwise it’s henscratching and not even a hen can understand it. Without writing, people couldn’t send messages in a bottle, write stories, or send a letter. Our words, our stories, belong to us.

Ryan Higa's How To Write Good, Jessica Mellor

Children's Book and Media Review

Ryan Higa is finally writing a book with the friendly ghostwriter, Sarah Tomlinson. In thirteen different lessons, Ryan teaches about pacing, foreshadowing, dialogue, the importance of details, and character development, among many other things. With a brief lesson at the beginning of each chapter, Ryan then delves into his own story growing up. Ryan grew up in Hawaii as a carefree child—that is, at least until his mother put him in a private school away from all his friends. Ryan then had to deal with bullying and the dark thoughts that surrounded him. As Ryan changed his perspective and took …

How Gender Affects Writing: Jackson’S And Fitzgerald’S Portrayals Of Mental Illness, Cryslin A. Ledbetter

Criterion: A Journal of Literary Criticism

Cryslin Ledbetter's essay, "How Gender Affects Writing: Jackson’s and Fitzgerald’s Portrayals of Mental Illness" examines the similarities and differences between Shirley Jackson's We Have Always Lived in the Castle and Fitzgerald's Tender is the Night. Through a careful comparison of male and female writers, the author analyzes defining factors that effect the final product of each novel.

Guy-Write: What Every Guy Writer Needs To Know, Rebecca Lambert

Children's Book and Media Review

With this book in hand, kids can not only read about their favorite topics, but they can write about them as well. This book teaches kids how they can write engaging stories that use humor, gross stuff, sports, superheroes, battles, scary stories, emotional writing, and more. The book focuses on using effective description to show what is happening to the characters, rather than simply telling the reader what is happening. This book also includes interviews with skilled writers of different genres. These authors offer valuable insight into effective writing techniques.

King Alice, Leah Christopher

Children's Book and Media Review

It’s another snow day for Alice and her family, but Alice will make sure it is not boring! With a tired Dad tagging along, Alice declares herself king and orders Dad to write a book. Creatively, Alice patterns her wild chapters after the day they have together at home—a royal knights' tea party with Mom and the baby, dinner time with pirates, and a toy unicorn stampede. King Alice illustrates Dad's pages, taking several breaks to watch TV and—yikes—have a timeout. Thankfully, it is soon time for a bath, and Alice enjoys reading their homemade book for a bedtime story …

Tulip And Rex Write A Story, Katherine Cooper

Children's Book and Media Review

Rex is a sweet dog who loves going on adventures with his owner Tulip. In another lovely story about the friendship between Tulip and Rex, the two go on an adventure to find wonderful words to write in Tulip’s new notebook. With those words they write a story about King Rex and Queen Tulip. Tulip and Rex Write a Story is the second book in this series, following the book Tulip Loves Rex where we are first introduced to Tulip and her pet dog.

Darius & Twig, Meagan Andrus

Children's Book and Media Review

Darius and Twig are best friends who support each other in their individual interests. Darius loves to write and Twig always gives good feedback, Twig is a runner and Darius is always at his races to cheer him on. As they go throughout their junior year of high school, they both begin to question who they are and who they can be. College scouts watching Twig and the potential publication of Darius's story force the two to make some decisions about their futures. Towards the end, both Darius and Twig come to realize that who you are is a compilation …

Love That Dog, Nicole Clark

Children's Book and Media Review

Jack, a young student in Mrs. Stretchberry’s class, is sure that he doesn’t like poetry. He doesn’t understand any of the poems he reads in class, and he is convinced that poetry is only for girls. Through his teacher’s gentle persistence, Jack begins to see his own life experiences in the poems he reads— and develops his own identity as a poet. This gradual change culminates in a visit with one of Jack’s newfound-favorite poets: Walter Dean Myers.

All Four Stars, Aylea Stephens

Children's Book and Media Review

Gladys Gatsby loves to cook, but her parents want her to stop after she almost burns down her kitchen with a blowtorch trying to make creme brulee. Her parents forbid her to cook or read about cooking and instead to play outside and make friends—things that don't sound appealing at all to Gladys. When a mix-up with a school assignment gets her a job as a food critic, that is if she can get to the restaurant and submit a review good enough to convince the newspaper that she can do the task, she makes friends with people she never …

Ideas Are All Around, Kristie Hinckley

Children's Book and Media Review

Philip C. Stead combines mono prints, collage, and Polaroid photographs in Ideas are All Around. The narrator, a young child, takes a walk with his dog and sees all kinds of things around him in nature. He also “takes a walk” with his typewriter across the page. He isn’t sure what to write about, until he sees shapes in the clouds and his neighbor sees a horse in some accidentally spilled blue paint. After these experiences he realizes that he actually has lots of ideas, he just has to figure out what to do with them. Ideas truly are all …

Sword And Verse, Abigail Packard

Children's Book and Media Review

Raisa is Arnathian, and in a the country of Qilara that means she’s a slave. After watching her parents’ and brother’s brutal murder during a raid, Raisa escapes the same death by pretending that she is not the daughter of a Learned One (an Arthanian who can read and write; a blasphemy in a world where only Scholars of Qilara are allowed this ability). Instead, she is enslaved by the people of Qilara. After the treason and execution of the current tutor in training, Raisa is selected to be the next future tutor, an honor only allotted to two Arnathians …

Finding Serendipity, Corie Darrington

Children's Book and Media Review

Finding Serendipity follows Tuesday McGillicuddy on a daring quest to find her mother, famous author, Serendipity Smith. Just as she is finishing the latest book in her famous Vivienne Small series, Serendipity goes missing from her writing room. Tuesday, along with her dog Baxterr, set off to solve the mystery of her disappearance. While investigating her mother's writing room, Tuesday starts to type out her story on her mother's typewriter and is carried off to a secret land just for authors. Upon arrival, she meets a librarian, who sets Tuesday on her way. However, rather than creating her own world, …

Book: My Autobiography, Aylea Stephens

Children's Book and Media Review

Book: My Autobiography is the story of books as told from the perspective of a unique character, Book itself. Between black and white illustrations and an occasional quote about books, Book describes its history from the days of storytelling before writing was invented to the burning of books. It discusses the invention of paper and the alphabet, the evolution of copying books to the printing press, the development of libraries, and the potential future of books in the digital age. All of these things help provide a broad, simple overview of the history of books, writing, and storytelling.

The Journal Of Response To Writing: A Response To A Professional Need, K. James Hartshorn, Norman W. Evans

Journal of Response to Writing

In a conversation with an editor of the Journal of Second Language Writing, the question was asked, “What is the most popular topic of submitted manuscripts to the Journal?” The response was as decisive as it was quick, “That’s easy. Feedback or response to writing is by far the most commonly submitted topic.” That brief exchange triggered a number of questions that needed answers. First and foremost among those questions is, if response to writing is such a popular topic, might there be a need within our profession for another venue for such scholarship? Though the Journal of Second Language …

Beyond “Giver-Receiver” Relationships: Facilitating An Interactive Revision Process, Elena Shvidko

Journal of Response to Writing

Research has shown that in order to facilitate the development of students’ writing, teachers need to cultivate principles of effective feedback. However, revision is a joint process, and for the maximum effectiveness of this process, there should be more than just a giver-receiver relationship with the teacher giving the information and the student receiving it. Instead, students should be actively involved in the revision process by reflecting on and analyzing their own writing and meaningfully responding to teacher feedback. This teaching article describes a technique—Letter to the Reviewer—that facilitates collaboration between the teacher and the student. A Letter to the …

Review: Checking Out Chekhov: A Guide To The Plays For Actors, Directors, And Readers, Valleri J. Robinson

Russian Language Journal

Sharon Carnicke’s Checking out Chekhov: A Guide to the Plays for Actors, Directors, and Readers provides a succinct foundation for understanding how to read Chekhov’s mature plays for theatre practitioners and students who so often encounter his work. As one of the most often produced and adapted playwrights in professional and academic theatres, Chekhov must be produced by theatre professionals that have a handle on how to think, talk, and, ultimately, produce Chekhov. While many books aimed at this audience offer interpretive readings, analytical strategies, and historical contexts for engaging with Chekhov’s unique dramatic worlds, none approach Chekhov using Carnicke’s …

Visitor's Switzerland In Haiku, Marilyn Driscoll

Swiss American Historical Society Review

During some of her vacation trips, Marilyn Driscoll enjoys writing

Haiku as a way of recording her personal impressions. She shares with

us her "Visitor's Switzerland" that grew out of a brief trip in 2009. Her

other Haiku collections include impressions of Iceland, Ireland, Sicily

and Turkey.

Architectural Chastity Belts: The Window Motif As Instrument Of Discipline In Italian Fifteenth-Century Conduct Manuals And Art, Jennifer Megan Orendorf

Quidditas

Offering advice on a range of topics from the quotidian to the extraordinary, from superstition to scientific, fifteenth-century conduct manuals appealed to readers of all Italian social classes. This essay focuses specifically on manuals which prescribe behaviors for women, and investigates the reception of these precepts and the extent to which these notions informed and transformed women’s lives. Specifically, I examine one piece of advice which recurs throughout instructional literature during this time: the prescribed notion that women should remain far removed from their household windows for the sake of their honor, reputation and chastity. Widely read manuals, such as …

Introduction To Volume 58

Russian Language Journal

It was the Russian linguist, Grigorii Vinokur, who first introduced the term “kul’tura iazyka” or “language culture” to Russian in his writings on the changes taking place in the Russian language in the aftermath of the Bolshevik Revolution (Kul’tura iazyka [Moscow 1929]). Loosely defined as language production at all ranges of the discursive spectrum, the term provided Vinokur with a useful heuristic for writing about language in flux in a manner that took into account not just the high-end linguistic production of belles-lettres, but also the everyday language use (and abuse) of more mundane, but equally influential sources – including …

Using Writing To Enhance Learning In Religious Education: Practical Ideas For Classroom Use, Dennis A. Wright

Religious Educator: Perspectives on the Restored Gospel

No abstract provided.

My Life As A Salmon, Tom Johnson

Inscape

No abstract provided.