The Discovery of Competence: Teaching and Learning with Diverse Student Writers

The Discovery of Competence shows how the writing classroom can be reconceived as an environment for collaborative inquiry by students and teachers. It presents new ways of thinking about program design, redefines the nature of writing assessment, and offers alternative conceptions of multicultural curriculums. Drawing on students' writing and research, it suggests how teachers can recognize their students' competence and help them build on it systematically.

While the book speaks to all teachers of writing, it will be of considerable interest to those who work with diverse student populations, including ESL students. The authors make it clear that the writing classroom is a place where both students and their teachers may build on their competence and realize their possibilities as writers and learners.

Eleanor Kutz is a professor of English and dean of the Graduate College of Education at the University of Massachusetts at Boston, where she teaches courses in freshman writing, linguistics, the nature of literacy, discourse analysis, and the teaching of English. She is coauthor of The Discovery of Competence: Teaching and Learning with Diverse Student Writers (Boynton/Cook, 1993) and An Unquiet Pedagogy: Transforming Practice in the English Classroom (Boynton/Cook, 1991).

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