Reviews for Teaching Academic Writing: An Introduction for Teachers of Second Language Writers

The average rating for Teaching Academic Writing: An Introduction for Teachers of Second Language Writers based on 2 reviews is 4 stars.

Review # 1 was written on 2019-11-13 00:00:00 Danielle Rodriguez This book would be of interest to anyone who teaches/wants to teach composition. I got a lot out of it. It discusses theories of how beginning and experienced writers compose (this was especially interesting to me because I recently came off that book which introduced literary theories--how people read, essentially! Now I have in my head lots of ways that people approach generating and analyzing texts). Beyond discussing theories of composition, it gives great sample dialogues between writing tutors and students. These dialogues model the techniques described by the book--how to get your student to brainstorm, analyze the assignment's language, build thesis statements, etc. The dialogues also present successful and not-so-successful interactions between tutors and students. In terms of theory, I was intrigued by the book's argument--experienced writers know that writing is "dialogical." That is, they are constantly conversing with a "reading self," a sort of interior "other" that offers the kind of feedback that a careful reader might. Inexperienced writers have to learn to dialogue with themselves about their work, and, as the writer develops this other self, the writing tutor can be a helpful stand-in. Cool idea about writing being dialogical, and seems true to me! (On a sidenote, the book encouraged the tutor to talk to their student about the writing process. Some students might view the writing process as quick, neat, and easy, and get frustrated and think they are doing it all wrong when writing is hard. The book says, tell the student that writing is messy and full of struggles! Give them a realistic model! As a writer I found this reassuring, haha.) One tutoring tip that hit home for me--don't overwhelm with advice, insights, comments, and feedback! In retrospect, I think I did this as an editor with my authors. The book had a very good point that you want to take your students at their own pace, interests, and styles of learning. In general, I really liked how this book stressed how to help your students learn by leading them further into their own minds and ideas. Ask questions instead of telling what to do! Other tips had to do with helping students begin to formulate and organize ideas into writing. These tips were all very concrete (various types of list-making, diagramming, idea-mapping, glossing, etc). I think I'd like teaching composition--I feel like you'd be helping students develop both intellectually and creatively. This is a clear book with lots of useful information! The edition I read was written in 1987, though, so at times it is rather amusingly dated.

Review # 2 was written on 2020-05-22 00:00:00 Stan Burt some useful heuristics and a sound philosophy on improving the *writer* as opposed to a single piece of writing, but super idealist and more than a little redundant.