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Student Writing: Cause & Effect
As part of our online writing class, I asked my students to write a "cause & effect" paper. The longer I live, the more I realize the importance to both remind myself and tell others: each choice we make takes us somewhere and gives us some consequences,...

A Writer’s Good Friend
Tonight three students and I in our online class were working on a "Definition" paper, that defines a word. One student from Shenzhen, China wrote to define "happiness" and how a person can have that emotion. As we read the essay, I noticed some words were used...

Student Writing: Compare & Contrast Essay
The "compare and contrast essay" is a favorite of writing teachers. I recently assigned it to my Thursday online writing class, and here are some of their papers. The students had total freedom to pick their topic. I think the students do a particularly...

Use Strong Nouns
Today I was working with a writing student in Hsinchu, Taiwan, helping him get ready for his ACT. And a big part of the ACT writing section--or any writing for that matter--is strong word choice. Excellent word choice can help you cut wordiness and clutter. As...
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