Teaching English in the Two-Year College - Volume 35, Issue 2, 2007

In the early 1990s, a small group of dedicated two-year college English faculty, led by Helon Raines, began the fight for the Two-Year College English Association (TYCA), a professional organization that would give two-year college English faculty across the nation a respected identity and voice within the National Council of Teachers of English (NCTE).

The problems of plagiarism in a digital age continue to challenge the teacher/student relationship and may require more aggressive teaching strategies and student/teacher dialogue instead of more aggressive electronic detection and punishment.

This essay suggests ways to help students breathe life into their personal narratives by, on the one hand, encouraging them to find the “truth” of their stories and, on the other, encouraging them to play a little fast and a little loose with that truth.

The author questions monolithic notions of Standard English by exploring dialects, gender, and the complexities of language in various social and cultural contexts.

Eva Payne served as a consulting reader for Gregory Shafer’s essay and expressed these opinions in a letter to the author that is part of our review process. This is the original letter, recast in third person for publication.

We argue that linked-course learning communities serve students at nonresidential metropolitan public universities by increasing their academic achievement, reducing their attrition, and engaging them in the project of public education.

The intersection of the call for civic engagement and the call for student scholars at the center of writing pedagogy, along with the daunting challenge of introducing beginning students to the demands and rewards of academic writing, is an ideal location for a revival of Ken Macrorie’s I-Search paper.

This article describes classroom exercises and writing assignments through which students can use Shakespeare’s plays to develop their own thoughts about various social and personal norms, develop an empathetic yet critical understanding of others’ positions, and learn to express their own ideas more fully.

Professing and Pedagogy: Learning the Teaching of English by Shari J. Stenberg. Urbana, IL: NCTE, 2005. 172 pp. reviewed by Tim N. Taylor, Eastern Illinois University Charleston, Illinois; Writing on the Margins: Essays on Composition and Teaching by David Bartholomae. New York: Bedford/St. Martin’s, 2005. 400 pp. reviewed by Michael G. Boyd, Illinois Central College East Peoria, Illinois; What Is “College-Level” Writing? by Patrick Sullivan and Howard Tinberg. Urbana, IL: NCTE, 2006. 418 pp. reviewed by Cortney Palmacci, Nova Southeastern University Pembroke Pines, Florida.