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InAfter the Public Turn, author Frank Farmer argues that counterpublics and the people who make counterpublics-\"citizen bricoleurs\"-deserve a more prominent role in our scholarship and in our classrooms. Encouraging students to understand and consider resistant or oppositional discourse is a viable route toward mature participation as citizens in a democracy. Farmer examines two very different kinds of publics, cultural and disciplinary, and discusses two counterpublics within those broad categories: zine discourses and certain academic discourses. By juxtaposing these two significantly different kinds of publics, Farmer suggests that each discursive world can be seen, in its own distinct way, as a counterpublic, an oppositional social formation that has a stake in widening or altering public life as we know it.Drawing on major figures in rhetoric and cultural theory, Farmer builds his argument about composition teaching and its relation to the public sphere, leading to a more sophisticated understanding of public life and a deeper sense of what democratic citizenship means for our time.

In theory, computer game-based learning can support several vocabulary learning affordances that have been identified in the foreign language learning research. In the observable evidence, learning with computer games has been shown to improve performance on vocabulary recall tests. However, while simple recall can be a sign of learning, observation of skill application in communication is a better indicator of skill mastery. Further, observing this use in separate communicative contexts could constitute evidence of transferability of skills. Hence, this paper presents the results of two investigations of learning outcomes in EFL classes at a Japanese university using computer game-based lessons. The first study was a quasi-experiment comparing use of targeted words in a writing task between a group of students who participated in a computer game-based lesson, and a group of students who did not. The second study was a cross sectional analysis comparing use of targeted vocabulary in a writing task with amount of participation in computer game-based lessons. The results suggest that computer game-based approaches to foreign language education in real-world classrooms can improve transferability of learned vocabulary.

This study extends research on written corrective feedback (CF) by investigating how timing of CF affects grammar acquisition. Specifically, it examined the relative effects of synchronous and asynchronous CF on the accurate use of the hypothetical conditional structure. Participants were 68 intermediate-level students of English at a university in Japan. Learners from a synchronous CF group (SCF), an asynchronous CF group (ACF), and a comparison group completed 2 writing tasks using Google Docs. The 2 experimental groups received focused direct CF with the following differences: The SCF group received synchronous feedback on grammatical errors during writing tasks, while the ACF learners received feedback after the tasks. Participants revised their texts upon receiving the feedback. The comparison group completed the writing tasks without feedback. Accurate use of the target feature was measured by a set of 3 text reconstruction tasks conducted as pre-, immediate post-, and delayed posttests. The results showed that both experimental groups significantly improved from the pretest to the 2 posttests while the comparison group did not. Overall, however, effect sizes for the posttests indicated that SCF was more effective in improving learners' accuracy with only the SCF group outperforming the comparison group on the delayed posttest.

Among a growing body of research that examined the contradictory role of written corrective feedback (WCF) in development of L2 writing accuracy, this study investigated the possible impact of focused metalinguistic WCF on discourse markers (DMs) in writing performance of an intact group of 42 Iranian English as a Foreign Language (EFL) learners over an eight-week period. In an authentic, situated, and personalized learning platform, giving and receiving WCF were made possible only through the mobile-mediated application of WhatsApp. Before participants wrote on selected elicitation topics, they had taken part in a 2004 version of Oxford Preliminary Test in order to be screened for their initial differences in writing performance. After receiving metalinguistic WCF on their scripts, participants were required to work on the coded feedback and try to eliminate the DM errors in their revised writing assignment. After collecting the scripts over an eight-week period, the content of written assignment was thematically analyzed using NVivo 21 Software for the additive, adversative, causal and temporal DMs, following Halliday and Hasan’s (Cohesion in English., 1976) typology. In a convergent mixed-methods design, the content analysis of the qualitative data showed a larger distribution of additive DM than adversative, causal, and temporal DMs in all participants’ written scripts. Exploring the possible impact of metalinguistic WCF on improving the DMs accuracy, analysis of the frequency count data with Statistical Package for the Social Sciences (SPSS) multivariate Chi-square test reported the fluctuation and unsystematic patterns of distribution for four types of DMs with no sign of significant long-term improvement in DMs accuracy after receiving metalinguistic WCF. These findings implied further research on practicing alternative WCF strategies focused on variety of error types in actual and virtual L2 writing environments.

Educators strive to create \"assessment cultures\" in which they integrate evaluation into teaching and learning and match assessment methods with best instructional practice. But how do teachers and administrators discover and negotiate the values that underlie their evaluations? Bob Broad's 2003 volume, What We Really Value, introduced dynamic criteria mapping (DCM) as a method for eliciting locally-informed, context-sensitive criteria for writing assessments. The impact of DCM on assessment practice is beginning to emerge as more and more writing departments and programs adopt, adapt, or experiment with DCM approaches. For the authors of Organic Writing Assessment, the DCM experience provided not only an authentic assessment of their own programs, but a nuanced language through which they can converse in the always vexing, potentially divisive realm of assessment theory and practice. Of equal interest are the adaptations these writers invented for Broad's original process, to make DCM even more responsive to local needs and exigencies. Organic Writing Assessment represents an important step in the evolution of writing assessment in higher education. This volume documents the second generation of an assessment model that is regarded as scrupulously consistent with current theory; it shows DCM's flexibility, and presents an informed discussion of its limits and its potentials.

Little is known about the effects of various planning and revising conditions on composition quality in experimental or TESOL education research. This study examined the effects of planning conditions (planning, prolonged planning, free writing, and control), subplanning conditions (task-given, task-content-given, and task-contentorganization-given), and revising conditions (initial-essay-accessible and initial-essay-removed) on the text quality of English as a foreign language (EFL) learners' argumentative writing. Participants were 108 19-year-old Chinese EFL learners. The researchers assigned the participants to the experimental and control conditions through stratified random sampling. Results show that the free-writing condition enhanced the quality of the learners' writing; the task-contentgiven condition and the task-content-organization-given condition produced significantly better quality texts than the task-given condition; and no significant difference in the text quality between the initial-essay-accessible and initial-essay-removed conditions was found. Free writing facilitated content retrieval, which enhanced the overall text quality. The task-content-given condition and the taskcontent-organization-given condition successfully reduced the cognitive load of the task on the EFL writers' working memory resources. The initial-essay-removed condition resulted in better quality final drafts, albeit with no statistically significant difference. Implications for further research are discussed.

This volume explores the challenges facing practitioners in higher education who use online environments and explores strategies for enhancing the experience of learners. The book focuses on online feedback, collaboration, and course design.

What is Creative Writing? Millions of people do it, but how do we do it, really? What evidence of its undertaking does Creative Writing produce? How do we explore Creative Writing and how do we come to understand it? This book considers these questions and analyses the very human activity of Creative Writing.

Designed to facilitate teachers’ efforts to meet the actual challenges and dilemmas they face in their classrooms, Becoming a Teacher Researcher in Literacy Teaching and Learning : provides background information and key concepts in teacher research covers the \"how-to\" strategies of the teacher research process from the initial proposal to writing up the report as publishable or presentable work illustrates a range of literacy topics and grade levels features twelve reports by teacher researchers who have gone through the process, and their candid remarks about how activities helped (or not) helps teachers understand how knowledge is constructed socially in their classrooms so that they can create instructional communities that promote all students’ learning. Addressing the importance of teacher research for better instruction, reform, and political action, this text emphasizes strategies teachers can use to support and strengthen their voices as they dialogue with others in the educational community, so that their ideas and perspectives may have an impact on educational practice both locally in their schools and districts and more broadly. Preface Part 1: Defining, Planning, and Starting Your Teacher Research Part 1 Introduction So, What Is Teacher Research Anyway? Creating Your Research Questions—The First Step in Inquiry Planning Your Inquiry Writing a Preliminary Literature Review to Inform Your Inquiry Part 2: Enacting, Analyzing, and Writing Up Your Inquiry Part 2 Introduction Strategies for Data Collection Analysis—What do the Data Mean? Writing Up Your Inquiry as an Evocative Account Part 3: Teacher Researcher Reports Part 3 Introduction Katie Paciga’s Inquiry Paper Reading, Writing, and Sharing: The Journey to Become Kindergarten Authors Cindy Pauletti’s Inquiry Paper Word Detectives: Students Using Clues to Identify Unknown Words in Text Kristen Terstriep’s Inquiry Paper Toss Out Your Dictionaries: A Look at More Effective Vocabulary Instruction Sandra Zanghi’s Inquiry Paper Letting Their Voices Be Heard: Improving Literature Response Participation during Read-Alouds through Small-Group Discussions Tara Braverman’s Inquiry Paper What’s This Word? Helping Sixth Grade Students Use Reading and Vocabulary Strategies Independently Libby Tuerk’s Inquiry Paper Let's Read: Motivating Junior High Students to Become Life-Long Readers Meg Goethals’s Inquiry Paper \"Books that Have Ghetto Feelings\": How Reading Workshop Increases Inner-City Eighth-Graders’ Motivation, Engagement, and Comprehension Dawn Siska’s Inquiry Paper Challenging the \"I Quit!\" Going ‘Round and ‘Round with Literature Circles in a Secondary Reading Classroom Courtney Wellner’s Inquiry Paper \"But This IS My Final Draft!\" Making Peer Writing Conferences More Effective for Struggling 9 th Grade Students Shannon Dozoryst’s Inquiry Paper Using Writing Workshop to Guide Revision Nicole Perez’s Inquiry Paper Coaching as a Collaborative Process Catherine Plocher’s inquiry Paper Coaching for Change in a K–8 Urban Elementary School: Building Cultures of Collaboration and Reflective Practices Epilogue: Further Reflections and Possibilities Appendices Appendix A: General Peer Conferencing Form Appendix B: Common APA (American Psychological Association) Citing Conventions Appendix C: Reminders for Grammatical and Other Language Usage Index Christine C. Pappas is Professor Emerita, Curriculum and Instruction, University of Illinois at Chicago. Eli Tucker-Raymond is Research Scientist with the Chèche Konnen Center at TERC.