Parlindungan Pardede

Universitas Kristen Indonesia

The 5th International Seminar 2011 SWCU November 21, 2011

Outline
Introduction Literary Review Methodology Results and Discussion Conclusions & Reccommendations

Weblogs (or blogs) are a recent but rapidly popular internet application. Emerged in 1998, blogs grew to more than 200 million in 2009. An easy to use online space for writing, blogs can be very advantageous to language teaching and learning, because they a. provide learners with genuine writing practice b. offer a venue in which they can reflect, comment, question, review, and communicate outside the classroom in an authentic environment c. provide an alternative way of communicating with teachers and peers d. provide an opportunity to create a virtual collaborative classroom environment

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Despite blogs great potential, the use blogs in writing classes is new. To be effective, it requires us to know: the what and the how of blogs, how blogs can fit with our understanding of writing development and how it can best support our pedagogical practice, what our students think and feel about the use of the new technology.
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 To explore students interest and perception on the use of BALL (Blog Assisted Language Learning) as an additional component in writing skills development To asses whether the respondents interest and perception in the use of BALL are correlated or not.
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Literary Review
Five influences of using blogs for students in English writing (Zang,
2009): a. facilitate the students critical thinking skills. b. provide examples for students to model and to learn c. encourage students to enhance their writing quality. d. facilitate meaningful learning for students e. give students a purpose for writing.

Students preferred to write on the weblog than the traditional ways,

and weblogs can improve English in the context of ESP (Arani, 2005) Blogs as web publishing tools can be used to improve the students writing skills and improve other skills such as information searching and literature review skills (Tekinarslan, 2008)

1. Participants
Groups Attended Class n %

Freshmen Sophomores Juniors Seniors

Writing II (Paragraph Writing) Writing IV (Essay Writing) Academic Writing Cross Cultural Understanding
Total

31 26 23 22 102

30.39 25.49 22.55 21.57 100

Each group actively participated in both real and virtual classes (blog). Assessment: 20% for regular attendance and participation in real classroom; 20% for regular assignment posting in blog; 30% went for mid-term test posted in the blog; 30% went for the final test in real classroom.
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2. Time: even semester of the 2010/2011 Academic Year 3. Place: English Teaching Study Program of FKIPUKI, Jakarta 4. Design: explanatory mixed method (gathering qualitative input to explain and extend quantitative results for gaining a comprehensive insight of the research 5. Data collection techniques: Survey and Focused Semi Structured Open-ended Interview
6. Data analysis technique: descriptive and the linear correlation coefficient statistics

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Results and Discussion

Length of time using the internet before joining BALL
Group Never 1 year 2 years 3 years 4 years 5 years > 5 years

% 6.45

% 70.97

% 16.13

% 6.45

% 0

% 0

% 0

Freshmen Sophomores
Juniors Seniors

3.85
0 0

3.85
0 0

57.69
4.35 9.09

30.77
82.61 31.82

3.85
8.70 50.00

0
4.35 4.55

0
0 4.55

Total

2.94

22.55

22.55

35.29

13.73

1.96

0.98

Most respondents has began to access internet as soon as they attended the university

Place for getting internet connection to work in BALL

internet kiosks 8% mobile phone 16%
campus 34% The participants could access the internet connection easily.

others 4% home 38%

Perception on the Use of BALL for Writing Skills Development

1. Blogging is effective to develop writing skills
SD 4%

Yes, blogging is very useful and effective to use to develop writing skills. Based on my experiences, blog made it possible to discuss with lecturers, friends and other people. (Sophomore 1)
I like blogging very much. Not only because it's something new but it also provides me many useful gadgets and resources which are helpful in writing. (Junior 2) Yes, blogging is very effective to develop writing. This program, in which blogging is combined with the conventional real class is very wonderful. If I'm allowed, I'd like to join it though I have graduated. (Senior 1)

D 9%
N 25%

A 62%

Perception on the Use of BALL for Writing Skills Development

2. accessibility of other students writing is helpful
SD 9%
D 13%

Yes, reading my friends works was cool because I was able to see what they thought about things we did not used to talk about in class. (Junior 2)
I often found grammatical errors in my friends postings, and I used them to reflect my own works. Thus, reading my friends writing is a good way to improve my writing skills. (Freshman 3).

A 56%

N 22%

Perception on the Use of BALL for Writing Skills Development

3. Commenting and giving feed-backs one to another is helpful
SD 9%
D 13%

I always found my friends feedback useful. They made me realize weaknesses I was not previously aware of. But receiving and giving feedbacks are two different things. I cant risk of hurting my friends feeling by commenting to their errors in writing. (Senior 3)
Feedbacks really helped me to produce better writing. But for me it was usually uncomfortable to show a friends errors. (Sophomore 3)

A 56%

N 22%

Yes, its cool to get some feedback on what Ive written However, Id rather not to criticize my friends work. It might hurt their feelings. (Junior 1).

Perception on the Use of BALL for Writing Skills Development

4. possibility to post from anywhere and anytime helps to submit D assignments on time
SD 0% N 23%

4%

Yes, this is the reason why I prefer to submit my assignment through the blog than using a print-out. (Junior 1). It really helped me to submit my assignment on time. (Freshman 2)

A 73%

Perception on the Use of BALL for Writing Skills Development

5. Articles in the web provide good models
SD D 4% 5% Reading the huge number of blogs with various types of article provide me with a variety of styles and ideas to write. (Senior 3)

N 21% A 70%

To write like native speaker necessitates you to read a lot of their works, and the internet provides you with tons of such articles. Before writing to discuss a topic, reading some related articles will be helpful. (Sophomore 2)

6. Online writing manuals helps in using punctuations, citation, and referencing

Group Freshmen Sophomores Juniors Seniors

SD f 6 2 1 0 % 19.4 7.69 4.35 0 f 10 5 1 0

D % 32.3 19.2 4.35 0 f 5 6 5 4

N % 16.1 23.1 21.7 18.2 f 6 10 11 9

A % 19.4 38.4 47.8 40.9 f 4 3 5 9

SA % 12.9 11.5 21.7 40.9

X 2.74 3.26 3.78 4.22

Those who responded strongly disagree and disagree to this statement mainly belonged to the freshmen and sophomores who did not yet need citation and references to finish their (paragraph and essay) writing assignments. In contrast, the seniors who were assigned to write academic articles always needed citation and references.

Respondents Interest in the Use of BALL for Writing Skills Development

Statement
Write more productively after joining BALL motivated to produce better works because they are accessible to everyone Like blogging for the availability of dictionaries, thesaurus, and references Prefer to discuss a topic via blog than 'face-to-face Blogging drives to check diction and spelling more carefully. Blogging is rewarding due to having large audience.

SD
f 10
4

D
f % f 24
16

N
% 23.5
15.7

A
f 27
40

SA
% f 29
36

X %

% 9.8
3.92

12 11.8
6 5.88

26.5
39.2

28.4 3.51
35.3 3.67

2 2 2 8

1.96 1.96 1.96

4 2 3

3.92 1.96 2.94

20 14 11 20

19.6 13.7 10.8 19.6

30 42 37 36

29.4 41.2 36.3 35.3

46 42 49 22

45.1 3.65 41.2 3.82 48 4.02

7.84 16 15.7

21.6 3.35

Clarification on respondents interest obtained from the interview

1. Preference to discuss a topic via blog than 'face-to-face While speaking, you dont have much time to organize your ideas. On the other hand, writing provides you much time to do it. (Sophomore 1) To be convincing, you need to explore and systematize your idea. You can do it while writing but not while speaking. Thats why I feel more confident to discuss a serious topic through writing than through speaking. (Junior 2). 2. Motivation to check word choice and spelling more carefully Knowing that many people can read and possibly comment on my posting urged me to write more carefully. (Junior 3) You know, in CCU class we were often assigned to write about American culture. Can you imagine what Americans will say if they found my postings about their culture are inaccurate and reckless? Such consideration always drive me to write more carefully in the blog. (Senior 1)
3. fondness to write in the blog due to having a large audience Realizing that my works are read by many people is one of reasons why I like writing on the blog. Its natural, isnt it? (Junior 1) It was really cool when someone read not to mention cited what I wrote in his blog. Thats why I always revised my works before posting them. (Senior 2)

Correlation of Interest and Perception

The linear correlation coefficient analysis on interest and perception correlation resulted the coefficient (r) = 0.98. This indicates the correlation coefficient between respondents interest and perceptions is very strong. By using = 0.05 and degree of freedom (df)= n-2, the t-table= 1.986, whereas the tcount = 49.25 Since the tcount (49.25) > t tabel (1.986), it was concluded that respondents interest and perceptions were positively and significantly correlated. This indicated that both variables significantly affected each other.

Conclusions and Recommendations

The majority of the respondents viewed the use of BALL to develop writing interesting and effective. The majority admitted they wrote more productively after joining BALL. The internet facilities (authentic articles and writing manuals) were very helpful to produce good writing. Fellow students works were used as a mirror to prevent errors. The greatest motivating factor for the respondents in writing in the blog is their realization that their works were visible to many people in the world. This awareness also motivated them to check word choice and spelling more carefully. The students familiarity with internet browsing skills and their level of writing mastery affected their interest and perception on the blogging activities. Further researches to determine how to most effectively use blogs in order to make better use of this interesting and authentic computerbased resource are recommended.