Academic Writing: Techniques and Tasks

There is a serious need for research and thought on ways to teach creative writing to foreign students from countries where creative writing is not encouraged. As an overseas English teacher, I am able to persuade my students to answer multiple choice, true-false, and short answer questions, but I draw a blank whenever I ask a question which calls for the least bit of creativity. Most of the material in the book seemed like truisms to me: topic sentences, organization of material, citing references, and avoiding logical fallacies. However, this may all be new to a student from a culture which does not encourage creative writing. Such a student is sure to relate to this book, because there is a second person pronoun on almost every line. The appendix includes articles which the author suggests as topics for discussion. They don't pertain directly to the topic at hand, but they are interesting. Read them anyway.