Improving Student Writing Skills: Innovative Programs and Technology-based Pedagogies
Educators everywhere are looking for effective ways to improve the writing skills of their students. This joint session demonstrates that responses to today's writing issues are being launched on more than one front, using different technologies. A collaboration among high schools, two-year colleges, and universities of the Montana University System has led to a network of educators who develop, administer and score a writing assessment, taken voluntarily by 70% of the state's high school juniors. Used for placement and admissions, the essays are submitted online but scored at regional sites. Joan Wines and Julius Bianchi focus on a CLU course pilot project that explores and identifies the practices that would best optimize the Kindle e-reader's potential for promoting deeper student engagement in critical reading and writing.
