Applying blog to motivate the students of class 11a4 at quynh tho high school in studying writing skill

MINISTRY OF EDUCATION AND TRAINING HANOI PEDAGOGICAL UNIVERSITY No2 TRINH THI PHUONG LIEN APPLYING BLOG TO MOTIVATE THE STUDENTS OF CLASS 11A4 AT QUYNH THO HIGH SCHOOL IN STUDYING WRITING SKILL (GRADUATION PAPER SUBMITTED IN PARTIAL FULFILLMENT OF THE DEGREE OF BACHELOR OF ARTS IN ENGLISH) SUPERVISOR: NGUYEN THI HA ANH, M A Hanoi, May 2014 ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS I would like to take this chance to express my greatest gratitude to Nguyen Thi Ha Anh, MA, my supervisor, for her patience in providing continuous and carefully guidance as well as encouragement, indispensable suggestions and advice I wish to thank all the lectures at Hanoi Pedagogical University Number 2, especially the lectures in the Foreign Language Faculty for their dedicated instructions during my years of university work I am particularly grateful to my close friends for their enthusiasm and kindness in helping me collect valuable reference documents and data for my research Last but not least, I owe a debt of gratitude to my beloved family, for their whole-hearted encouragement and endless support ii ABSTRACT Writing is viewed hugely important, yet it is a daunting task for both English as a second language (ESL) teachers and learners With the development of different approaches to teaching in general, numerous approaches to the teaching of writing have been evolved such as product, process and post process approaches Although these approaches have changes the role and status of writing over the years Writing still appears as one of the difficult areas to tackle as students lack academic writing skills and they are demotivated to write in English In view of this, researcher shows an interest in looking into the possibilities of using Information and Communication Technology (ICT) tools for language teaching and learning and Blog is known as an effective method in ESL classrooms The aim of this study is to apply blogs in developing the writing skills of ESL learners The study will further highlight the benefit of weblogs logging activities and the impacts of these activities on students‟ motivation to write in English as autonomous learners iii STATEMENT OF AUTHORSHIP Title: Applying Blog to Motivate the Students of Class 11A4 in Studying Writing Skill at Quynh Tho High School I certify that no part of this report has been copied or reproduced by me from any other person‟s work without acknowledgements and that the report is originally written by me under strict guidance from my supervisor Date submitted: May 2014 Student Trinh Thi Phuong Lien iv LIST OF FIGURES Figure 1: The use of blog in the students‟ previous writing classes Figure 2: The experience with blog of the students before this writing Figure 3: The students‟ ideas about writing and giving feedback through paper Figure 4: The method which the students like better: traditional (paper/ pencil) or blog Figure 5: The feeling of the students about using blog in writing Figure 6: The studentsattitudes towards using peer feedback to complete writing v TABLE OF ABBREVIATIONS EFL : English Foreign Language ESL : English Foreign Language ICT : Information Communications Technology vi TABLE OF CONTENTS ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS ii ABSTRACT iii STATEMENT OF AUTHORSHIP iv TABLE OF CONTENTS v Chapter 1: Introduction 1.1 Rationale 1.2.Research questions 1.3 Research objectives 1.4 Research scope 1.5 Research tasks 1.6 Significance of the proposed research 1.7 Design of the research work Chapter 2: Development 2.1 Literature review in brief 2.2 Blog 2.2.1 Definition of blog 2.2.2 Characteristics of blog 10 2.2.3 Functions of blogs in development of writing skills 12 2.2.3.1 Benefits of using blog 12 2.2.3.2 Challenges in using blog 14 2.3 Writing 15 2.3.1 Definition of writing 15 2.3.2 The types of writing 15 2.3.3 Audience 16 2.3.4 Context 16 2.3.5 The characteristic of good writing 16 2.3.6 The importance of writing 17 2.3.7 The process approach for teaching writing 17 vii Chapter 3: Research Methods 20 3.1 Rationale 20 3.2 Participants 21 3.3 The setting 21 3.4 Research instruments 21 3.5 Procedure of the study 23 3.6 Data analysis procedure 25 Chapter 4: Results and Discussion 27 4.1 The attitude of students before using blog 27 4.2 The attitude of students after using blog 32 4.3 Discussion 35 Chapter 5: Suggestion and Conclusion 37 5.1 Conclusion 37 5.2 Limitations 39 5.3 Suggestions for further study 39 APPENDICES 40 APPENDIX A 40 APPENDIX B 41 REFERENCES 45 viii Chapter 1: INTRODUCTION 1.1 Rationale Nowadays, the internet has emerged as a prominently new technology and played an important role in learning and teaching English in Vietnam The influence of such a powerful technological tool has pervaded all aspects of the education, business and economic sector of our life We can find any kind of references on internet very quickly and internet widely spreads in numerous fields and domains The technology has a lot benefits in learning foreign language The use of technology helps teachers and students in different ways Besides, it helps to motivate students to learn four English skills Students have opportunities to work in collaborative manner and share what they know or what they not know with friends all over the world “Technology gives students opportunities to use their productive and receipt ability for real purposes, such as publishing a new letter or writing interactive journals” (“school computing”, e-book) Face book, Twitter, Google, Zing me or Weblog, etc are social networks applied as means of technology in order to support for students in learning English Students can share thoughts, photos, music, links, ECT through social networks and they can communicate with all friends all over the world, and research The term “blog” is a contraction of two words: web and log Blog is known as a tool for written communication and interaction The term weblog refers to a personalized webpage, kept by the author in reverse chronological diary form Blogs are personal online journals which have recently become a collaborative technology, regarded as a new way for people to express their thoughts in public The form of writing has become popular among internet uses Most blog writers (bloggers) use this environment, as writing in blogs to help people become more thoughtful and critical in their writing Blogs can also be used to publish and exchange personal knowledge The idea of using blogs in language learning is similar to the use of journal writing which is a way to help students explore and assimilate new ideas, create links between the familiar and unfamiliar, mull over possibilities, and explain them to others Every student can get chance to express himself or herself and publish his/her thoughts On the other hand, the teacher and other students can contribute their understanding on the publication Hence, the students can strengthen their knowledge, by constructing their own meanings in writing and interpret these meanings based upon their understanding and experiences Blogs, therefore, should be used to promote writing skill among ESL learners The differences in the system of language may bring about learning problems for foreign language learners Hence, Vietnamese students face difficulties in writing There are four component skills in learning English, namely: reading, writing, speaking and listening In other word, writing can be a way of expressing ideas through written form By writing, we can compare our opinion with the people who read our writing Writing can be considered as media in expressing feeling and self expression and it can be enjoyed not just for the writer itself but also for the reader That is why people write to express their feelings, ideas, or thoughts and to be read by other In teaching four skills, there are many techniques usually used by teacher But a lot of teachers say that they face difficulties in teaching writing English because it is not easy to find out the effective way to motivate students in writing lesson Blog is viewed as a tool in facilitating the development of writing skills to ascertain such contention Several research studies concur that the use of a blog can positively enhance learning in the second language classroom Moreover blog can improve writing skills Research has confirmed positive uses of the blog which include writing for an audience and peer review, the development of a sense of community in a class through a collaborative learning environment Blog can stimulate student‟s interest and also increase the student‟s ability in writing especially in making sentences The pie chart shows the felling of the students about using blog in writing It can be clearly seen that only one student (4%) did not like using blog while 10 students (40%) really and really loved this new technology students (28%) said that they loved doing blog, students (20%) answered “good” and students answered “alright”.The pie chart shows that there are 29 students out of 30 students prefer blog It means that blog is useful to motivate students in writing class Question 6: Did you enjoy using online peer feedback to complete writing papers? Yes: No: 29 The results are displayed by figure 6: Figure: Yes 3% No 97% Figure 6: The students attitudes towards using peer feedback to complete writing The pie chart indicates that the students mainly enjoy using online peer feedback to complete writing papers 29 students (taken up 97%) liked using online peer feedback and student (accounted for 3%) did not like online peer feedback 34 Through the pie chart, majority of the students used blog because they want to apply high technology in improving writing skills Only one student investigated answered that she did not like for many reasons  Discussion In conclusion, from questionnaires: 4, and 6, it can be seen clearly that all the students liked using blog and online peer feedback in their writing class According to their opinions, blog have many advantages and one of the most advantages is that blog bring interesting lesson in writing class Besides, instead of using traditional method with paper and pencil, they chose using blog because they were approached with model method known as computer With blog, the students did not feel shy and they felt very comfortable and confident when they share their writing on blog together Besides, the students helped each other to trace mistake in their work and their products will be exposed to many readers after being posted on blog The students perceived that blogging helped them improve their writing skills mainly because they were helped through criticism and they can learn vocabulary, writing styles, contents, and organization of ideas from the teacher and friends They also stated that since their paragraph would be published online, they were compelled to write well and be more careful with their grammar Blogging could be considered as an effective platform in facilitating the development of students‟ writing skills 4.3 Discussion Teacher should encourage students to use blog in improving English writing skill According to interview answers of the students, learning English writing through blogs brings many advantages Learning through blogs helps students to approach using technical English in improving writing skills and skills as an internet user with awareness about blogs Besides, learning through blogs helps students to save their time and money They not need to meet each other to work together, giving peer feed back through blogs, students and 35 their peers can help students to learn By giving useful advice and comments from help they fell interested when various readers can read and find their strengths and weakness in English writing skill in order have the best works In conclusion, the results from this study indicate that the students in the study generally perceived the use of blogs for English language learning positively They stated that giving comments through blogs increased their confidence, improved their writing skills, facilitated the sharing of ideas with the classmates, and brought them to their classmates The students express their thoughts and allowed them to acquire skills such as conducting online writing and thinking critically about issues After conducting the blog in writing activity, the researcher found the positive attitude of the students towards writing skill 36 Chapter 5: Conclusion and Suggestions 5.1 Conclusion As the result of research has shown that most of students agree that using blog can improve their writing skills and using blogs in learning writing skill should be done inclasses Some of the best reasons are learning through blogs helps the students to save their time They not need to meet each other to work together, and they can get more useful advice and comments from their peers The peer suggestions are often easy for them to check the mistakes so that their writing skills are also easily improved Peer feedback is supported by several theoretical backgrounds The collaborative nature of learning through blogs and using blogs as an online portfolio enables students to reflect on their learning process and provide and receive feedback from more capable peers The interactions and showing of their experiences using blogs enhance the authentic use of the target language, which is highly crucial in the learning process Most importantly, students can reflect, change or edit what they write as learning is a developmental process and, thus, improve their self-editing skills and become more independent learner In addition, blogs facilitate writing to a real audience, hence increasing students „self-confidence and motivation to write more and share their experiences with their peers Not only the students but also the teachers and parents are able to monitor and access their work at any time even after months or years, as blogs have a record of what is published in a blog achieve This also helps the students to monitor their own progress and become more reflective learners The current study corroborates the findings of other studiesthat blogging helps facilitate the development of students‟ writing skills With more than eight weeks of training students to write paragraphs through blogging, the students‟ writing improved particularly on content and organization Although there are other factors that may come into play that could have orchestrated their writing 37 improvements like instruction, motivation, and self-efficacy which were not covered by the study, we can‟t also deny the fact that blogging has contributed to the development of students‟ writing skills Results of interview and the students‟ proved that the students themselves perceived that blogging honed their writing skills through reading and commenting on their peers‟ paragraphs since the students had access on peers‟ paragraphs Likewise, they also enjoyed reading peers‟ content, style, structure, flow and organization However, language teachers particularly writing teachers should first train the students in critiquing paragraphs through workshops prior to peer editing so that they can readily spot flaws in a piece of writing during the actual peer review Furthermore, with intensive training on critiquing paragraphs, they will not only be able to understand what to avoid in writing but also what basic tips to apply in writing academic papers effectively With the facilitative effects of blogging on students‟ writing competence, language teachers, therefore, may introduce blogging as a platform for students‟ writing of essays online In that way, students found writing enjoyable and fun because aside from the satisfaction they may fell for having a wide readership, it will also boost their confidence on their writing abilities The study showed that frequent blogging on random topics hones writing skills, which in effect, and enable the learners to take pride in their writing achievements, thus, developing their self-esteem We can‟t also discount the importance of direct instruction in developing students‟ writing skills Since the findings of the study show that students find text organization as their topmost difficulty, language teachers, therefore, should intensify the use of cohesive devices in their instruction so that students can readily use appropriate transition markers in their paragraphs Finally, a follow up study can also be conducted to delineate the effects of blogging, instruction, and peer feedback on the development of students‟ writing skills using multiple regression analysis 38 5.2 Limitations The study still has some limitations First of all, this study was implemented in a small number of participants leading to the vague findings Therefore, the study would be more successful if a large number of students participated the research and more students know how to use and to apply blog in learning English Moreover, recently, the course had lost the data of class blog It made students hard complete their assignments The information security of Tumblr blog is not very high However, fortunately, managements have been repairing the damage of Tumblr and the data security of Tumblr is better than before 5.3 Suggestions for further study Only with eight weeks, the research was carried out at grade eleventh of Quynh Tho high school to show that classes of different proficiency levels would be needed to find out the probable effects of peer feedback on development of their second language writing It is also suggested that teachers should join online discussions the students have i.e on articles, news and steer them towards right directions as well as probe them to view things from different angles In spite of its limitations, the study concludes that blogs facilitate studentcentered learning and allow the students to explore and share their learning experiences outside the confines of the classroom As proven by research, the Internet plays a vital role in introducing new platforms like blogging has positive effects on developing students‟ writing skills based on several qualitative studies, limited research have been done to ascertain the effects of blogging on writing proficiency compared with the traditional tool, paper and pen, in writing essays Thus, this study recommends that experimental research be conducted using modes of writing academic essays, the traditional paper, pen and the innovative writing on a computer via blogging to ascertain which mode is more effective in honing students‟ writing competence 39 APPENDICES Appendix A Answer the questions below and honestly as possible Have you ever used blog in one of your previous writing classes? Yes: No: Did you have any experience with blog before this writing course? Yes: No: Do you like writing and giving feedback through paper Yes: No: Which method you like better: traditional (paper/ pencil) or blog, why? Traditional (paper/ pencil): Blog: How you fell about using blog in writing? Terrible: Alright: Good: Great: Excellent: Did you enjoy using online peer feedback? Yes: No: 40 Appendix B Interview questions: Question 1: Do you like peer feedback through paper? And why? Student 1: No, I don‟t I like writing paragraphs through using online feedback Student 2: I prefer using online feedback to using peer feedback through paper because we work under groups to discuss about our paragraphs through using comments I like hearing what someone else thinks, someone might help you to make your writing even better, your partner may have a good idea, you won‟t make the same mistakes after someone helps, it‟s like giving each other feedback Another reads it before a teacher does, you will know what you did wrong and you can fix it, your partner may catch errors I wasn‟t able to catch, they could help me be, so I not make mistakes, if they are smarter than me, they can help and I am always open to new advice, it gives me good feedback Student 3: yes, I I don‟t like using online peer feedback, I prefer feedback through paper For me, people don‟t listen to me even if it‟s a good idea, I never get along with other students, I‟d rather work alone I am more focused and work faster And I not like people correcting me, it makes me feel stupid I not want to be made fun of, they will think my writing is boring, I don‟t want to be judged, my writing is kind of private, people may criticize me, people may think I am weird Question 2: Do you like using blog in writing? Why? Student 1: Yes, I prefer using blog to using traditional (paper/ pencil) way because I don‟t feel shy and I feel very comfortable and confident when we share our writing on blog together Student 2: By applying blog in learning writing helped us to improve writing skills We are helped through criticism and we can learn vocabulary, writing styles, contents and organization of ideas from teacher and friends So, I interested in using blog 41 Student 3: I feel great, it‟s helpful, get someone else‟s perspective, I feel like a teacher Student 4: yes, I like blog because applying blog in improving our English writing skills And, blog brings to us many advantages such as: motivating us in learning writing skills and approaching using technical English through using internet by computer Student 5: Blog help us to save time because we stay at home but we still work together by sharing comments on internet by computer We don‟t need to meet each other to work Student 6: No, I don‟t It makes me uncomfortable when many readers read my writing Question 3:Do you think that learning from peers’ comments on blog to help you approach to high technology known as computer? Student 1: our teachers can easily check mistakes students met in writing and control students by using blog on internet We can use online tools to support their writing: Student 2: It helps us to save time and money We can use computer for writing and discussing with friends through comments posted on blog at home, instead of going to the class for discussing together Student 3: we use computer before to post in blog any their paragraphs and we feel interested to publish their ideas in blog, it motivates us, and could be useful for practice writing more and more I think that using computer to post in blog that will encourage students to approach to high technology Question 4: Do you like working with other students to get a final product? Student 1: Yes, I you get more help, you get a better grade, you communicate with other students and it‟s easy and helpful I like to share my 42 ideas and hear other ideas, I like getting help from someone, working as a group is more fun to me, once I know them its fun, when my partner is smart Student 2: No, I don‟t People don‟t listen to me even if it‟s a good idea, I never get along with other students, I‟d rather work alone I am more focused and work faster Question 5: What benefits you get (if any) through using blog? Student 1: This way of learning has taught me to be more careful in writing my paragraphs because when I posted my paragraph in blogs, it makes me write the best way I can because a lot of people will read my work Student 2: Blog is perfect choice for me to improve my writing skill Since, it would be practically seen by anyone, I became conscious and it always reminded me to write better Student 3: depends on who I talk to my friends too much, It depends on what mood I‟m in Student 4: Yes, I believe that after applying blog, there are a lot of students change their attitude because in fact, your writing skills were improved clearly and they had interesting and effective writing lessons So, I and my classmate spend more times in order to write paragraphs and to give more and more comments on our blog Student 5: Before I have never felt interested in learning writing English, but after applying blog in writing lessons, I feel very comfortable and interested in the lesson My teacher can help our class to check mistakes easily and with more and more students Moreover, when I read comments from my classmates about what they think of my paragraphs I had the chance to know the impact of my writing to various readers and to know my points of weakness and strengths Question 6: Do you think that we should apply blog in the future? Student 1: Using blog and other online activities was really fun I have learned how to be a creative writer and a wide reader as well The activity also gives me 43 the opportunity to view other people‟s work This allows me to see other people‟s writing style and gain inspiration from it Blog brings many advantages in improving writing skills, so we‟d better use blog in the future Student 2: we should use blog in the future It brings to us many benefits Student 3: today, internet plays a vital role in motivating students in learning English Using blog helps the students to approach to high technology and it also brings many advantages to reach to high result in motivating the students in learning writing Blog is very important and the teacher should apply blog to improve writing skill and change the students‟ attitude to be better in writing class 44 REFERENCES Aljamah, H F (2012) Saudi Learner Perceptions and Attitudes toward the Use of Blogs in Teaching English Writing Course for EFL 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in Language Education In M Thomas (Ed.), Handbook of Research on Web 2.0 and Second Language Learning (pp.274-291) Hershey: IGI Global Reference Richardson, W (2005) Blog Revolution: Expanding Classroom Horizons with Weblogs Technology and Learning, 26(3),48 Stanley, G (2005a) Blogging for ELT Retrieved December 12, 2007, from http://www.teachingenglish.org.uk/think/resources/blogging.shtml Stanley, G (2005b) Why Blog? Retrieved July 28, 2008, http://searchenglish.bristishcouncil.org/attachments/se/Why% from 20blog PDF Steel, V (2006) Product and process writing http://www.teachingenglish.org.uk/think/write/approaches.shtml 47 Retrieved Ward, J (2004) Having a BALL with Blog- Assisted Language Learning LORE: An E-Journal for Teachers of Writing Retrieved September 29, 2008, fromhttp://www.bedfordstmartins.com/lore/digressions/content.htm?dis13 Zhang, D (2009) The Application of Blog in English Writing Journal of Cambridge Studies Retrieved from cam.org.uk/data/archive/2009/200901-article8.pdf 48 http://journal.acs- ... teaching But the topic is relatively new and the purpose of this study was to investigate the use of blogs to motivate the students of the class 11A4 at Quynh Tho high school about learning writing. .. following goals: To evaluate the effects of blog to facilitate the students at Quynh Tho high school in English writing To find out the benefits of blog in improving the student‟s English writing 1.4... Research scope The research focuses on using the blog to motivate the students in English writing The population involved in the study is 30 students of class 11A4 at Quynh Tho high school 1.5 Research