"In the electric, pulsating world around us, the essay lives a life of abandon, posing questions, speaking truths, fulfilling a need humans have to know what other humans think and wonder so we can feel less alone."
—Katherine Bomer

Sadly, many students only know “essay” as a 5-paragraph, tightly structured writing assignment that must check all the boxes... more

Leila Christenbury’s Making the Journey has long been a beloved classic in English methods courses as well as with in-service English teachers whose dog-eared copies occupy a permanent place on their classroom desks. The Fourth Edition adds a fresh new voice from veteran English Education professor Ken Lindblom, whose expertise in writing instruction, teaching with technology,... more

Writing assignments are road maps—or they should be. They guide the writer on a journey. They lay out a process, envision a destination.  They are designed. As Jim Burke explains it:  “What we are really doing when we create a year’s worth of writing assignments, of experiences, is designing a story.  Each day’s class a sentence, each week a paragraph, each unit a chapter... more