Middle school and high school teachers will learn how to guide students through the prewriting, writing, and revision processes using formative assessment techniques. Focusing on the classic five-paragraph essay format, the book offers tips on breaking large writing assignments into several smaller tasks, identifying red flags, and varying feedback methods. The first section of the book provides a theoretical introductory overview of formative assessment, with explanations and examples of monitoring, diagnosing, giving feedback, providing time to grow, and grading. The second section applies theory to actual formative assessments for prewriting, writing, and revising, using writing samples from real students. Tuttle has been a classroom teacher, technology integration teacher, technology director, and college instructor for education and English. He also served as president of the New York State Association for Computers and Technology in Education. Annotation ©2010 Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com)