The research compared students’ summary writing ability before and after they were taught through blog, a new medium or tool for written communication and interaction in many different languages around the world. The research design is a kind of one group pretest posttest. Participants were 33 first-year students who studied EN 011 course (English in Action) in the first semester of the academic year 2012 at Bangkok
University. They were divided into six groups. Five or six students in each group created a and they worked together for fourteen weeks to produce six pieces of summary written work. Each member in the group worked through providing comments, editing and revising on the blog until the group got a
final summary paper and submitted that to the teacher for grading. The instruments used in this study were (1) two summary writing tests (2) a questionnaire surveying students’ attitude toward learning through blogs, and (3) postings on blogs to reflect their learning experience.
The results revealed that after the students worked together on weblogs, their English summary writing mean score of the posttest was higher than that of the pretest, and
they had positive attitudes towards using weblogs in learning. Regarding cooperative
learning experiences through using weblogs, most students thought that it was
interesting, a new experience to work with their friends on the weblogs.
INTRODUCTION
Writing is seen as a difficult productive skill. It conveys a meaning from the thinking process to the reader. By writing, we can share ideas, arouse feeling, and persuade other people (White and Arndt, 1991). Moreover, writing can be a good reflection of students’ overall understanding of English learning. Since writing is a complicated process that involves the cognitive process, the social context and the need for
people’s routine life, it is not an easy skill for one to acquire. Writing ability is not acquired naturally; it requires the learner to be taught and practiced in the form of the academic environment. A number of educators have identified two factors that cause an ineffective teaching and learning of writing. First, it comes from the students themselves; they lack basic writing skill, and they also lose confidence in writing. In addition, they need a lot of practice as they don’t have enough chance to practice writing.
TYPES OF BLOGS
Three types of blogs commonly used in the language classroom are the tutor blogs, the learner blogs, and the class blogs. First, the tutor blog is what the teacher sets and runs it for students to practice reading, explore of English websites, and exchange thei opinions online by using comment buttons, access class or syllabus information, so it serves as a resource of links for self-study. Second, the learner blog is what an individual student creates and runs. Students can post their thoughts related to their
reading. Thus, it encourages student self-expression; it also develops a sense of ownership. Learner blogs are most suitable for reading and writing classes. Lastly, then class blog is shared by both a teacher and students. Sometimes it is used by a whole class to work collaboratively. It encourages students to post messages, images and links related to classroom discussion topics. The class blog can facilitate project-based learning, and it can be used as a virtual space for an international classroom language
exchange (Campell, 2003)
WEBLOGS IN ENGLISH LANGUAGE LEARNING
In recent years, interest in using blogs in classroom has been increasing due to the advancement of technology. Weblog is also gaining popularity in English language learning context. Most of educational institutions fully support the use of computer technology as a tool for language learning. According to Noytim (2010), weblogs have been asserted to have powerful means for developing English language teaching and learning for many reasons. Weblogs offer authentic learning environment through real communication. In writing, the audiences are not only teachers but also peers including other people outside the classroom, a global audience.
Therefore, weblogs can motivate students to write more, they can write both academic and non academic. Through blogs, students can write and comment on their friends’ writing, they can discuss and share their common interests and individual differences.
When using blogs, students can get feedback from other audiences; they have an opportunity to read things in which they are interested and write things they really want to (Aljamah, 2012). Likewise, Dawns (2004) points out that using blogs in writing classes improved students’ writing skills. Nadzrah & Kemboja (2009) state that blogs let students write their compositions with specific purposes. Blogs are very effective tools in teaching and learning since they provide students with an environment that helps students reflect and publish their own thoughts in form of writing (Ferdig & Trammell (2004).
According to Mynard (2007) blog is a powerful tool for language instructors to encourage students to express or reflect their ideas on their learning experience and add their comments to their friends’ blogs to encourage further reflection.
Blogs also integrate students into the world of interconnected media; they become familiar with using blog both as a writer and a reader. Blogs also provide a great value in developing critical thinking skills, writing skills and information literacy
As a teacher, weblogs can provide a bridge between lessons. Teachers can post materials that recycle and review vocabulary and topics presented during lessons. As well, blogs can save the teacher time as information about schedule changes, homework assignments etc. Galien & Bowcher (2010) asserts that using the blogs provides students an additional as well as motivating opportunity since they publish their works in a non-judgement fun environment. Moreover, blogs provide increased and more balanced students communication and they allow the shy, quieter students to have more time to consider
what to write and to formulate their responses .According to Bloch, (2008) using blogs for teaching writing skills is very useful because of many reasons:
blogs are easy to create and maintain;
they encourage students to be more prolific writers;
they make writing easier to share;
they support group work, feedback, and collaboration;
they provide opportunities to write outside of class;
they can access or link to multimedia and related texts; they offer
students with sense of authorship; and
they encourage teachers to use blogs in various ways of teaching
