Designing Writing Assignments

Author(s): Traci Gardner

Effective student writing begins with well-designed classroom assignments. In Designing Writing Assignments, veteran educator Traci Gardner offers practical ways for teachers to develop assignments that will allow students to express their creativity and grow as writers and thinkers while still addressing the many demands of resource-stretched classrooms.

She explores how to balance pedagogical and curricular goals with the needs of multiple learners while managing everyday challenges such as mandates, testing, and the paper load.

Gardner uses her classroom experience to provide ideas on how to effectively define a writing task, explore the expectations for a composition activity, and assemble the supporting materials that students need to do their best work. This book includes dozens of starting points that teachers can customize and further develop for the students in their own classrooms.

A companion website also offers readers resources such as

complete lesson plans available on www.readwritethink.org
links to relevant NCTE standards, position statements, and guidelines
an online bibliography that includes links to related NCTE journal articles
links to online lesson plans, teaching resource collections, and education policy issues

109 pp. 2008. Grades 9–College. ISBN 978-0-8141-1085-0.

No. 10850

View a Sample Chapter/Article

View a Sample Table of Contents

* Journal articles are provided in PDF format and can be opened using the free Adobe® Reader® program or a comparable viewer. Click here to download and install the most recent version of Adobe Reader.

ISBN: 978-0-8141-1085-0

Grade Level(s): Secondary, College