Transcript File

Distance Education
Projects
Megan Mendenhall
Distance Education
ITEC 67436
Project 1
 Article read: Blogging as L2 Writing: A
Case Study
 From AACE Journal, 2008
 Authors: K. Armstrong and O. Retterer
Participants
 College Intermediate level Spanish class
 Two seniors, two sophomores, and twelve
freshmen in the class
 Comfortable with using the internet prior to
taking the course
Objectives
 The researchers asked three questions:
 “Could blogging provide an opportunity to help
students become more actively immersed in a
foreign language over the course of a
semester?”
 “Would students write more using a blog than
in traditional course?”
 “Would students feel more confident writing in
a foreign language because they were writing
weekly?”
(Armstrong & Retterer, 2008)
The Study
 Used own blogging software
 Community blog and personal blog
 Community blog—shared among classmates
 Not graded, 20% of grade was in participation of
the blog
 A place for students to experiment using language
 Personal blog—between instructor and
student
 Included graded work on nine different
assignments
 An e-folio where students looked back at progress
The Study Continued
 Used the following to find results:
 Survey
 Word-counts of graded vs. not graded work
 Pre and Post oral test
 Looking for improvements in language usage
Results
 Do students write more using the blog?
 Could not be determined since there was no control
group
 It seemed as though they wrote 10 times as much as
other similar courses
 Did language usage improve?
 Yes; verb usage improved
 May not be directly related to weblog, but students
who wrote 3,000 words or more (average amount)
significantly improved verb usage
 Did student comfort level increase?
 100% agreed they felt more comfortable with writing
and manipulating verbs
 Attitude: 85% of students either enjoyed or really
enjoyed using the blogs
Project 2
 Article read: The Effect of Weblog
Integrated Writing Instruction on
Primary School Students Writing
Performance
 From International Journal of Instruction,
2009
 Author: O. Simsek
Participants
 College writing course
 70 undergraduate students
 Between 18-21
 Department of Primary School in Marmara
University (Istanbul, Turkey)
 Experimental and Control Group
 Experimental—15 males, 20 females
 Control—13 males, 22 females
Objectives
 The researcher asked two questions:
 “Is there any difference between the writing
performance of students who received inclass writing instruction and that of those who
received the weblog integrated writing
instruction?”
 “What are the perceptions of students towards
using weblog in writing performance”
(Simsek, 2009)
The Study
 Simsek evaluated results with:
 Quasi-experimental and survey design
 Used writing performance pre/post test, student
questionnaire, interviews, and rubrics
 Students given a choice of topic to write a
paragraph about for pre/post test
 These were graded by two instructors trained
to use the rubrics aligned with Composition
Profile
 Average writing scores were determined and
put into a computer program
The Study Continued
 For student perceptions on blog usage, a
questionnaire was given with questions based
on the following areas:
 Effect on writing performance
 Effect on feedback and revision
 Interest/motivation
 Communication
 Independent learning
 Technology use
(Simsek, 2009)
Results
 Is there a difference in writing performance
when using weblogs in a course?
 5 writing objectives evaluated (content,
organization, word-choice, mechanics, and
language)
 Both groups improved in all areas
 Experimental group had sufficient gains in
content and organization
 No significant gain in word-choice, mechanics, and
language
 Possible explanation: blogs brought more
awareness of content and organization of posts
Results Continued
 What are students perceptions of using
weblogs?
 Students felt that blogs improved their writing
performance in all areas
 Had a sense of ownership and responsibility
for their writing
Comparing the projects
 Similar in three ways
 Students
 Both undergraduate college level, between ages
17-22, and a mixture of males/females
 Objectives
 Both asked questions similar to improving student
usage in language; also questioned student
attitudes on using blogs
 Results
 Both found increases in language usage; also
majority of students had positive feelings toward
using the blogs
My favorite
 Blogging as L2 Writing: A Case Study
 This article went into more detail about the
actual use of blogs throughout the course
 I liked the idea of two different blogs
 The community one made students feel more
relaxed, therefore they tried experimenting with the
language
 The personal blog could give them instructor feed
back and served as an e-folio—great for reflecting