Texting, tweeting ought to be viewed as GR8 teaching tools, scholar says

Carol L. Tilley, a professor of library and information science at Illinois, says that critics who equate texting with literary degradation are wrong, and that they also overlook the bigger role that texting and its distant cousin, "tweeting," could play in education and research. Details here.

The New Writing Pedagogy

While students are writing more online, both in and out of school, teachers and administrators are challenged with changing the way they think about writing instruction and the tools used to write today. Read more from the November issue of District Administration magazine.

Teaching The New Writing

Read excerpts from this innovative guide, in which teachers share their stories, successful practices, and vivid examples of their students' creative and expository writing from online and multimedia projects such as blogs, wikis, podcasts, electronic poetry, and more.

Texting may help improve students informal writing skills

Despite a myriad of concerns, reports the Charlotte Observer, about the increasing use of text messaging by teens, some teachers and researchers say texting does not interfere with students' ability to use language properly and may in fact help students better express themselves through informal writing. "Writing is good. Writing is expressing thoughts. Expressing thoughts is good. We just don't like their modality," says Larry Rosen, a researcher and author of a book on the issue.

NC MS Uses iPod Touch Games to Help With Fiction Writing

At one North Carolina middle school, language arts students are using an iPod Touch game to help them develop different perspectives as they create characters and write fiction. The school may use the technology in other classes as well, says school Principal Edith Skipper. "This is how they learn, this is how they communicate with their world," she said. "We're running as fast as we can just to keep up. All of education is."

NCTE's Online Writing Gallery for Students Goes LIVE

Students and individuals nationwide are submitting their writing to the National Gallery of Writing, which posted their work online this week in celebration of the first National Day on Writing -- coordinated by the National Council of Teachers of English. Educators say the day and the writing project are intended to promote writing of all kinds by authors of all ages and backgrounds. See this story in the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette

Restructure Middle School Around Literacy: New Report Recommends

"Time to Act," a new report from the Carnegie Corporation's Council on Advancing Adolescent Learning, recommends restructuring middle and high schools around literacy. Schools should hire teachers skilled in literacy instruction across content areas, the Council says, and literacy training should be fully integrated into pre-service education and professional development for both teachers and principals. The report also calls for increased federal investments in middle level programs like Striving Readers, especially in high-needs schools, and for increasing emphasis on reading comprehension "within the nuanced context of each subject area." This link leads to a download page that includes both the main report and five key resource reports.

How Technology Changes the Way Kids Communicate

The current issue of PARENTING magazine addresses the impact of young people's gaming, texting and other Web 2.0 habits. Excerpt: "Scientists are just starting to study the social effects of these new types of communication, and much of their research focuses on adults and teens, not kids. By poking through those studies, though, it is possible to glean a few likely answers -- and, it turns out, there's much to be hopeful about."

Beyond Books: What is Literacy In A Digital Age?

According to this cover story in the current neatoday magazine: "....educators across the country are employing an array of digital tools—blogs, wikis, videos, and social media—to tap into their passion for collaborating, creating, and sharing."

Educators train in program to teach handwriting

The Washington Post reports: Some teachers in Virginia's Arlington County are learning to teach proper handwriting through a program called Handwriting Without Tears that uses music and and movement to teach students how to grip a pencil and form letters. Though some schools have abandoned handwriting lessons for typing classes, the training program emphasizes the importance of good handwriting and ways to teach it effectively.

NCTE Council Chronicle & Writing Resources

The September issue of NCTE's Council Chronicle includes a number of resources that will be of interest to teachers of writing, including a new policy research brief: Writing Outside of School.

Training is key to schools' digital media use

eSchool News reports: panelists at a recent Capitol Hill briefing said teachers need adequate staff development to leverage digital media's potential for education. Among those testifying: the National Writing Project.

Literacy Accountability in a New Media Age

A middle school teacher's commentary in the current issue of Education Week urges his fellow educators (and test producers) to consider the kinds of texts young people attend to today. "Reading video, images and other multimodal texts," he says, "demands just as much critical thinking and analysis as a challenging excerpt from Moby Dick."

Cursive may be a fading skill, but so what?

Text messaging, e-mail, and word processing have replaced handwriting outside the classroom, said Cheryl Jeffers, a professor at Marshall University's College of Education and Human Services, and she worries they'll replace it entirely before long. Read the rest of this Associated Press news story and consider posting a response.

Report: Reading and writing skills must be a priority

The findings of a five-year study of U.S. student literacy in fourth through 12th grades has education leaders calling for an overhaul of reading and writing instruction. Among the recommendations in the report, from the Carnegie Corp. of New York's Council on Advancing Adolescent Literacy, is teaching literacy across all subject areas, using data to inform teachers' professional development on literacy and reorganizing schools, if necessary, to focus on literacy. More details from Education Week.

Clive Thompson On The New Literacy

Are students writing more today than ever? Is Web 2.0 the reason? With student fascination and attraction to Facebook (et al), what is the future of writing? Read more at Wired's blog.

Can MySpace Make Better Writers?

The former director of the National Writing Project says yes: Richard Sterling, quoted in this Miami Herald newspaper story, believes that blogs, MySpace, Facebook, email, IM and texting all have potential for improving a student's ability to write.

Take part in NCTE's National Day on Writing (October 19, 2009)

To draw attention to the remarkable variety of writing we engage in and help make writers from all walks of life aware of their craft, NCTE has established October 20, 2009 as the National Day f Writing. To celebrate, NCTE invites diverse participants to submit a piece of writing to the National Gallery of Writing.

Report: Writing exercises built confidence, improved grades

Some seventh graders who were struggling in class did significantly better after performing a series of brief confidence-building writing exercises, and the improvements continued through eighth grade, according to researchers. Read more here.