About Writing

Brief Reviews of James Moffett’s Major Works

Author: John Warnock Summary: These brief sketches emphasize ideas for classroom practice found in the works of James Moffett, a writer and theorist in the areas of language and literacy and curriculum integration whose work has informed the practice of many NWP teachers. For teachers in any advanced institute or...

Innovative Writing Program Helps High Schools

Author: University of Arizona – University Relations Summary: This news article describes the Wildcat Writers, an innovative service learning and writing program housed in the University of Arizona. By exploring topics like censorship, designing infographics, producing novels, and organizing campus events, the high school writers learned how to promote literacy,...

Linking Genre to Standards and Equity

Author: Tom Fox Summary: Here is an important article that offers a framework and looks at how genre studies can help writing teachers design meaningful and engaging writing instruction. Fox suggests that standards-based writing curricula do not go far enough when we only teach students about how various genres work....

Literacy Coaches Explore Their Work Through Vignettes

Author: Carrie Usui Summary: What is the work of a literacy coach? Twelve UCLA Writing Project teacher-consultants serving as literacy coaches in the LA Unified School District spent a weekend retreat exploring that question by writing vignettes as a way to illustrate what it is they do as coaches. Here...

When Do Children Learn to Write? Earlier Than You Might Think

Author: Rebecca Treiman and Lori Markson Summary: Two developmental psychology scholars break down the beginnings of young children’s writing, with links to relevant research. This article could be useful for early childhood educators seeking to learn more about emphasizing writing in their literacy instruction, or aiming to advocate for the...

The Writing Assessment Badge Series: Public Criteria

Summary: NWP awards four successive badges to scorers and leaders at NWP scoring events. NWP Scoring Conferences are national events organized and facilitated by the National Writing Project where Writing Project teachers come together and train to score student writing to determine measurable outcomes of a program. Scoring Conferences consist...

30 Ideas for Teaching Writing

Summary: This resource offers successful strategies contributed by experienced Writing Project teachers. Readers will benefit from this variety of eclectic, classroom-tested techniques. These ideas originated as full-length articles in NWP publications (a link to the full article accompanies each idea below). This resource can be offered to summer institute or...

Why I Write: Scientist Timothy Ferris on Writing to Learn

Author: Timothy Ferris Summary: Ferris explains that he writes as a way to learn science and describes the vital role that science has played in changing the world for the better. He discusses how writing for general audiences can help scientists to “clarify their own thinking, by obliging them to...

Reflective Journaling for Deeper Student Learning

Author: Anna Collins Trest Summary: Are you struggling to get students to write during journaling time? Are the responses you get cursory or less than you had hoped? If so (and even if not), then read how one elementary teacher transformed the depth of students’ writing responses by transitioning from...

“Hey, Mom, I Forgive You”: Teaching the Forgiveness Poem

Author: Linda Christensen Summary: Linda Christensen, who has taught high school Language Arts for many years, builds a community of writers as her students write poetry about forgiving—or not forgiving. The author starts with her own story.