THE USE OF STUDENTS’ PERSONAL SELF-REFLECTIVE BLOG FOR ACADEMIC WRITING ACTIVITIES AMONG ESL TERTIARY LEVEL STUDENTS Noriah Ismail1, Intan Safinas Mohd Ariff Albakri2, Suhaidi Elias@ Alias1 1
Universiti Teknologi MARA, Segamat Johor (MALAYSIA) 2 Universiti Pendidikan Sultan Idris (MALAYSIA)
[email protected],
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Abstract This case study analyzes the use of students’ personal self-reflective blog for academic writing activities among ESL tertiary level students at MARA University of Technology. The study was conducted for a period of eight weeks among 18 ESL students who were taking an ESL English proficiency course which include an academic writing skill. The blog was part of the special online activities for the students enrolled in a supplementary online writing program which was developed using a Learning Management System known as EDU 2.0. The research tools used were in the form of students’ reflective online journal entries and a set of questionnaires. The results indicated that the students viewed their personal self-reflective blog to be effective in helping them to be inquisitive and critical during their writing process which enabled them to produce better written essays. Keywords: Self-reflective blog, ESL writing, tertiary level students, online journal, critical thinking.
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INTRODUCTION
At the tertiary level, learners often face the daunting task of mastering content area in their subject courses such as social studies or sciences which are often taught in English. In such cases, mastery in academic writing skill can help students to perform well in their academic subjects as asserted by Baskaran (1994) English plays a significant role in assisting the students to excel in their academic achievements. In his study Saville-Troike (1984) maintains that “the language skill which is most likely to develop . . . [academic] competence is writing” (pp. 217). Ability to write well is necessary both to achieve academic success and to demonstrate that achievement. Moreover, sufficient mastery in academic writing will help students to advance in their professional contexts (Adams & Keene, 2000). The bulk of the literature concerning ESL students’ writing problems and needs indicate the importance of these issues to be brought forward and given considerable attention by ESL writing instructors as well as the relevant people involved in helping students perform successfully in this skill particularly for academic purposes (Noriah Ismail, Supyan hussin & Saadiyah Darus, 2012). Various studies have also highlighted the problems faced by the students in learning academic writing among ESL tertiary level students in Malaysia which mostly concern having poor writing ability which results to poor writing quality and performance (Cheong Lai Wah, 2006) as well as their inability to be inquisitive and critical in their writing process (Wan Hurani Osman & Anna Lynn Abu Bakar, 2009). Hence, it is imperative that suitable and effective learning techniques and tools such as weblogs which can aid them to be critical and reflective writers be introduced to the students. Thus, this case study seeks to analyze the use of students’ personal self-reflective blog (SR-Blog) for academic writing activities among ESL tertiary level students.
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LITERATURE REVIEW
The term "weblog" was coined by Jon Barger on 17 December 1997 (Campbell, 2003). The short form and more popular name for weblog is blog (Campbell, 2003). A blog is a website consisting of online entries or posts which appear in reverse chronological order. Besides functioning as personal online diaries, blogs also serve as online brand advertising of a particular individual or company or used as an instructional tool for learning. In education, a blog can be a useful e-learning tool for students. Educators can use blogs to provide instructional materials and resources to students online. Studies have indicated positive outcomes with the use of blogs for language learning (Shahsavar & Tan, 2011). Moreover, in ESL context
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student writers who get the chance to post their essays, share their thoughts and reflect on their composing process in their personal blog showed better essay writing ability and performance. Walker (2005) maintains that blogs can be used by an individual student to practice writing. For instance, in a study carried out by Bloch (2007) in a second language composition class on one Somali immigrant student known as Abdullah, it was discovered that by writing in his personal blog, the student is able to develop his academic writing ability. The study which also analyzes a variety of writing strategies used by this student in his blog writing also provide evidence for his teachers regarding his academic writing strengths and weaknesses. Furthermore, Bloch (2007) maintains that utilizing blogs in an academic writing class help students to increase the amount of time they spent writing, contribute to the development of ideas and essay content as well as improve the students’ attitude towards academic writing. As posited by Canagarajah (1999) changing the students’ attitudes towards their own and their classmates’ writing may help them in developing their writing skills. In addition, having the means to share their learning experiences and exchange positive feedbacks with their classmates via blog writing increases their writing interests and motivation (Ward 2004; Zaini Amir, Kemboja Ismail & Supyan Hussin, 2011).Although it was not originally intended for educational use, studies have shown that blogs have been embraced as a favorable teaching and learning tool in second language classrooms (Walker 2005; Shahsavar & Tan, 2010). Blogs can be set up for individual students or for an entire class. Blog technology is also seen as a potential medium for encouraging reflective thinking and fostering critical inquiry among student writers. Yang (2010) investigates how 95 second language undergraduate Taiwanese students learning English who were required to write online reflective journal were able to be reflective on the differences between their own self-correction as well as their peers’ problem-solving process in writing. The journal entries were analyzed by content analysis to compare their reflection on self-correction with peer review in writing The results suggest that the opportunity to be reflective on their own self-correction enabled them to monitor, evaluate, and adjust their writing processes which helped to enhance their writing quality. Moreover, based on their peers’ reviews and opinions they are able to revise and improve on text development, organization and their writing style. This act of peer reviewing enables the students’ to be critical and support one another’s work. Hourrigan and Murray (2010) which reveals that the use of blogs can help language students to develop reflective learning strategies and that reflection can help students to ascertain their own writing weaknesses and strengths for the sake of future writing improvements. Similar findings can be found in Yang (2009) as well as Shahsavar and Tan (2011: 160) which postulate that “blogs can be used as a platform to solicit ideas and receive comments from others that may improve interaction and reflective and critical thinking.
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SIGNIFICANCE OF THE STUDY
Even though there have been a number of studies conducted on the use of blogs for education (Mah Boon Yih & Er Ann Nah, 2009; Hourrigan & Murray, 2010) very few concentrated specifically on ESL writing skill particularly on the use of an online writing activities that can enhance the learners’ inquisitive mind or critical thinking which is imperative in enhancing their writing performance and ability (Wan Hurani Osman & Anna Lynn Abu Bakar, 2009). Thus, the findings of this study will be a useful contribution to this particular field of knowledge.
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RESEARCH QUESTIONS
1. How does the use of the students’ personal self-reflective blog help them to be critical in learning academic writing? 2. In what ways do the students’ personal self-reflective blog help the students to enjoy learning academic writing?
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METHODOLOGY
The main purpose of this case study is to investigate the use of Students’ Personal Self-Reflective Blog for Academic Writing Activities among ESL Tertiary level students who were taking an academic writing course BEL311 at MARA University of Technology Malaysia. The participants for this study
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were 18 Diploma Part/Semester 3 students from MARA University of Technology Malaysia, Johor Branch. There are 2 reasons why they were selected as sample for this study. Firstly, accessibility as they were available to be involved in the study. Secondly, they were learning academic writing in a course known as BEL311 (English for Academic Purposes) which relates to this study. The students were categorized as intermediate group based on their test scores for Semester 2 General English language which is known as BEL 200 – Mainstream English. Students enrolled in BEL 311 course have 6 credit hours of class. Four hours are spent in the classroom and another two in the Language Lab. The participants were required to use Students’ Personal Self-Reflective Blog for Academic Writing Activities (also known as SR-Blog) which is part of an online academic writing program module for BEL 311 students which the students had to complete within eight weeks. The program was designed using a Learning Management System known as EDU 2.0. Using this Students’ Personal SelfReflective Blog, the students are encouraged post their reflections regarding their academic writing activities using a special Online Academic Writing Composing Guide (IQ-WCG). IQ-WCG includes seven writing steps which are 1) Ask, 2) Focus, 3) Seek, 4) Produce, 5) Correct, 6) Evaluate and 7) Reflect. In addition, the students were also encouraged to post and share their writing resources and sample essays as well as to read and provide constructive comments to their friends’ posts. In this research the instructor’s role was to facilitate the students in their use of SR-Blog. The instructor has had more than 5 years of teaching experience in the BEL 311course and has some experience in CALL (computer-assisted language learning). However, he had not utilized SR-Blog for teaching writing prior to this research project. At the end of the treatment, the students were required to answer a set of Survey Questionnaire. The survey questionnaires were first piloted to a group of 10 BEL311 students. The Post-instruction Survey Questionnaire contains 8 open-ended questions regarding their perceptions pertaining to the use of the SR-Blog for academic writing. The questions were meant to elicit the relevant answers for the research questions posed in this study. To further support the data, the students’ reflective online journal entries were taken from their SRB. The data collected were analyzed via descriptive analysis.
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FINDINGS AND DISCUSSION
The data collected provide some important findings regarding the use of self-reflective blog for academic writing course among ESL tertiary students. Firstly, the students viewed their personal selfreflective blog to be effective in helping them to be inquisitive and critical during their academic writing process which enables them to produce better written essays. The chance to reflect regarding their writing process in their own personal blog enabled the students to discover their own writing strengths and weaknesses and to improve on their writing. As one student puts it, “The writing activities I did in this blog helps me to be self-reflective and critical of my writing process”(S#7) and another student mentions that it allows him to “improve his writing ability as he is able to reflect on his own writing strengths and weaknesses” (S#3).Moreover, SR-Blog also helped them to provide each other with constructive comments and suggested ways to improve their academic writing skill. Similar findings can be found in Wang, Woo and Zhao (2009), Wang and Woo (2010) as well as Shahsavar and Tan (2011: 160) which reported that “blogs can be used as a platform to solicit ideas and receive comments from others that may improve interaction and reflective and critical thinking. In addition, SR-Blog provided them the opportunity to access, read various posts on effective academic writing which they can apply during their writing process. Besides that, they were also able to post and share their ideas and their sample essays as well as other good writing resources they found online and provide each other with constructive comments and suggestions regarding their posts which helped to enhance their writing ability. Ward (2004) reiterates that in ESL context student writers who get the chance to post their essays, share their thoughts and reflect on their composing process in their personal blog showed better essay writing ability and performance. Furthermore, the students also found that they enjoyed practicing their academic writing online and posting them in the blog. The students reported that they were more encouraged to practice writing using SR-Blog which also helped them to improve their writing quality. Similar findings are mentioned in previous studies regarding the use of Blogs for writing. For instance, a study by Shahsavar, Tan and Aryadoust (2010) reported the students’ positive acceptance and preference on the use of blog for learning. Another study by Juida Wan and Tan (2011) on the use of weblogs for English language learning at tertiary level in Malaysia of which twenty six students kept weblogs for a duration of a semester found that the students liked working on their weblog, were proud of their work and claimed
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that it is a good way to practice writing and preferred writing on their weblogs more than writing in class. This study also reports some minor limitations such as some of the students’ initial hesitation to participate or post in their SR-Blog especially during the first two weeks of treatment due to the lack of practice and being unsure of their own writing ability. However after some training and assistance from their instructor who assured them that their work would not be graded, they were less inhibited and felt more interested to participate. This is in line with Ropp (1999) who asserts that the less experience students have with an online learning tool, the more reluctance they exhibit even though the course can be beneficial for their academic progress and achievement. Hence, Ropp (1999) reiterates that it is fundamental that the students were given adequate training as this training phase is important for the students to start the course in the right gear.
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CONCLUSION
The findings of this study concur with studies on the use of the online learning tools for language learning which reported the students’ favorable views towards using Weblogs in language learning lessons and activities in ESL classrooms (Wang, Woo and Zhao, 2009). However, it is important to note that very few studies have been conducted in relation to the use of blogs in academic writing class particularly to discover its role in enhancing the students’ reflective and critical thinking skill during their writing process (Noriah Ismail et. al 2012). Likewise, Chan and Han (2005: 1-2) stressed that “in the Malaysian context, online learning which involves writing is therefore unsurprisingly still very much experimentation with researchers continually contributing to the effort of understanding what goes on in this new learning environment” and thus, focus should be placed upon this important field of study.
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