Figure 1: Enrolments by degree program (n = 45)
| Australasian Journal of Educational Technology 2010, 26(2), 209-225. |
AJET 26 |
Using blogs to help language students to develop reflective learning strategies: Towards a pedagogical framework
Tríona Hourigan and Liam Murray
University of Limerick
Due to the social changes brought about in no small part by Web 2.0 tools, the potential impact of the blog writing phenomenon upon teaching and learning contexts reveals an important area for consideration for all university educators, and in particular for e-learning practitioners. Today, web users may access a wide variety of media to express themselves and to communicate with others. These may include conventional blog websites such as blogger.com or indeed social networking sites such as MySpace, Facebook or Bebo, which continue to integrate blog tools and which also encourage self-expression on the part of the users. Moreover, the application of such written expression tools into a language learning context requires further investigation by the computer-assisted language learning (CALL) community, most notably in the field of exploring the distinct pedagogical environment which emerges within such a context. This paper shall detail the pedagogical and support role of the teacher as well as considering the content of learners' reflective output throughout the course of the semester. Our analysis will consider the overall teaching and learning environment, with additional qualitative examples from the learner blogs and essays in order to define clearly emerging roles and activities with regard to future classroom practice.
While already established within recreational online activities, the main challenge in exploiting these tools lies in establishing clear contexts of use across different disciplines in higher education. Thus, while some Web 2.0 applications are already being used in academic institutions as valid alternative approaches to the teaching of computer science, mathematics and statistics (Alt, 2006), CALL practitioners and teachers have also been quick to appreciate, evaluate and integrate such applications (Godwin-Jones, 2003; 2005). Despite the increasing use of mobile technologies with its echoes of 'invisible' ubiquitous computing and mobile-assisted language learning (MALL) practices (Kukulska-Hulme & Shield, 2008; Chinnery, 2006), many researchers continue to investigate the disruptive nature of technologies with their incumbent advantages and disadvantages (Heilesen & Josephsen, 2007). It is clear therefore that we should revisit Hubbard's description of CALL as being "most properly viewed not as computers teaching people but as people teaching people through the medium of computers" (1996:32).
Although researchers (Ducate & Lomicka, 2005; Hendron, 2003; Murray & Hourigan, 2005) have described and argued in favour of teachers adapting blog writing for all parties involved in the L2 and the cultural acquisition process, one must add a 'caveat' for teachers (and teacher developers) who are considering this process. Walinski (2005) describes an unsuccessful attempt to use blogs for feedback with ELT teachers in Poland who had been tasked with blogging about the integration and employment of e-learning methods in their teaching. Surprisingly, Walinski mentions no underlying theoretical perspective to this research and the integration timeframe is very short (2 weeks) with no attempt being made to address the participating teachers' fears and worries throughout the integration process. Despite Walinski's problematic methodology and rigid implementation, one definite and important caveat remains valid and relates to issues of blogger privacy and the appropriateness of the set tasks. Unsurprisingly, the main problems reported were the 'post-communist mindset' (reluctance to reveal private thoughts) and cultural practices with the teachers being obliged to continue to participate in the blogging despite the main task being of too personal a nature for the group (Walinski, 2005: 442).
Another caveat for teachers can be identified in a recent study by Strampel and Oliver (2008) who examined the reflective content produced by student bloggers in a university setting. Even though students in this cohort were encouraged to produce critically reflective blog postings, their highest levels of output typically fell under the categories of descriptive reflection and cognitive retrieval. This again highlights the necessity of investigating the quality of the learning experience established within the blogging environment in order to justify the potential bonus afforded by an alternative technological tool.
On the positive side, other researchers have described more successful attempts at integrating blogging for educational purposes, for improving L2 writing (Leja, 2007; Downes, 2004); for significantly increasing students' 'reflective learning processes' (Xie et al, 2008:18) and for developing an L2 community of writers (Sollars, 2007). Alm (2009) also highlights a number of additional advantages, discussing how using blogs in the classroom allowed a group of language students to control more readily their immediate environment, to personalise their own space and to engage in meaningful and relevant exchanges with their classmates. Furthermore, it is undeniable that "blogging requires higher-order thinking skills such as the ability to evaluate and synthesise" (Ford, 2007:9), therefore teacher and student roles should be clearly defined, in addition to "the complexities these sites showcase and what ramifications they may hold for our pedagogies and our field" (Vie, 2008: 23). In addition, Hsu and Lin (2008: 67) developed a model based on the theory of 'reasoned action' which involves "technology acceptance, knowledge sharing and social influences". Their project was effectively a group blog, strongly encouraging a single step approach in the use of the technology and the sharing of knowledge and discussion amongst student peers. This model uncovered the importance of "altruism and reputation" within their blogging context of 212 participants.
For our purposes, integrating blogware successfully into a classroom context means acknowledging the distinct set of tasks which emerge for both teacher and student in this environment. This is particularly crucial given the necessary steps which must be taken in order to adapt adequately to the blog writing task demands. Thus, following Kern's recommendation to "be prepared for new ways of structuring tasks" (2006:201) and Farmer, Yue and Brook's (2008) emphasis on introducing blogging as an integral component of the learning programme, we aim in this paper to outline clearly the particular activities inherent in our specific L2 blogging context. It is undeniable that there will be an inevitable blending of multimodal technologies on the web (Farmer, Yue & Brook, 2008: 195), and we do recognise the huge importance of this movement in the direction of 'media integration on the Internet' (Carney, 2009: 306). However, it may be stated that blogs continue to maintain their distinct 'presence' on the web, for example note the increasing popularity of the "citizen bloggers" on so many national newspapers (e.g. Le Monde, The Australian, The Times of London, Time Magazine, The Guardian, The Irish Times). This 'presence' reveals the ongoing need for the space with Web 2.0 to express ourselves in a particular way. Regardless of the medium / media chosen for expression, as educators we still have the choice of designing the pedagogic task to oblige the learner to either speak / record / listen via podcasting; to record visually via videologs; or to type the well-considered word.
After introducing the potential of using blogs for learning purposes, we shall now outline in more detail the methodological approach unique to this particular study.
Due to their familiarity with social media, as young people, students may in the past have been called "digital natives" (Prensky, 2001). However, our findings continue to show that they are not 'digital learning natives', in other words, they need to receive adequate and substantial tuition in exploiting ICT for learning purposes. Similar findings and questioning of Prensky's claims have been reported by Kennedy, Judd, Churchward, Gray and Krause (2008). Acknowledging that their report is limited to a study of the first year cohort of more than 2,000 students at an Australian university, the authors conclude: "It is difficult to expect students to have the expertise to judge how to best use emerging technologies for educational purposes" (Kennedy et al, 2008). In our context, before taking our particular module, learners would have followed more traditional modules on topics such as literature and grammar as part of their MFL course of study. As such, they would have not have registered on any formal course promoting the development of independent or generic ICT study skills. For a summary of the learners' profile at the commencement of the module, please refer to Table 1 and Figure 1.
| Main subject below | French | German | Spanish | TEFL | Gaeilge | Japanese |
| French with | - | 2 | 10 | 1 | 6 | 0 |
| German with | 0 | - | 5 | 3 | 2 | 0 |
| Spanish with | 0 | 0 | - | 10 | 1 | 0 |
| TEFL with | 2 | 0 | 2 | - | 0 | 1 |
Figure 1: Enrolments by degree program (n = 45)
Please refer to Figure 2 for a summary of this process. For more detail on this established expressivist blogging approach, please consult Murray and Hourigan (2007; 2008).
Figure 2: Establishing the reflective blogging task
This research study is part of ongoing action research over the last five years at the university regarding the development of an effective blog integration methodology. The discussion and analysis in this paper is based on qualitative data collated during this particular phase. Examples of personalised content of the learners' blogs and essays are examined in order to underline a number of salient themes emerging throughout the course of the semester. In addition, correspondence with the teacher as well as classroom observational notes is used to detail the distinct pedagogical context established.
Figure 3: Description of teacher activities
The question of technical support is a crucial consideration for any teacher thinking of introducing a new e-learning tool into the classroom. From our experience, this type of support is an essential and often time consuming requirement of the process. While students may indeed have an online social networking presence dedicated to their recreational activities, the appropriation of these or similar tools is often not so straightforward in nature within an academic context (Kennedy et al. 2008; MacLean & Elwood, 2009). What became apparent from our study was the necessity to establish good organisational practice from the immediate outset, in order to be prepared adequately for the wide variety of email requests. Given the lack of contact hours, students submitted their work and assignments electronically to the teacher. Examples from student correspondence included the following:
Another practical element of this developing teacher role included administrative duties such as calendar keeping and electronic content management. Frequent reminders had to be sent throughout the semester, underlining the upcoming completion dates of the learners' blogs as well as the submission of their essay based on the L2 blogging experience. Again, this was largely because of the limited contact hours which the teacher had with this particular group of learners. More importantly, managing this load of electronic content highlights another aspect of the process which emerged as a major consideration to be factored into the teacher's time management. Creating an electronic database of blog addresses was a basic requirement for this type of class, particularly as a means to keep up to date with students who sometimes deleted their original blogs and restarted using a new blog address. More crucially, given that the submission date was at the end of semester, the teacher's administrative function had to adapt quickly to any changes communicated by the students in relation to their blog spaces. Sometimes this type of action was due to the individual not producing the required type of L2-focused content. At other times this was due to a preference for a different blog hosting site for example Wordpress.com instead of Blogger.com. To complement both technical support and administrative functions, adopting the informal role of student learning advisor was another aspect of this process. This was particularly the case at the beginning of semester when many students sought reassurance as they began blogging. Thus, we had many messages from students expressing their inexperience and understandably seeking support at this early stage of the task.
The second category of the teacher's role - 'pedagogical activities' - was dictated to a lesser extent by specific student requests and depended largely on the teacher intervening at different points after the initial three week formal teaching period. Thus, the examples here are more descriptive in nature and detail the general tasks which emerged in this context. In comparison to the time-consuming administrative duties, these particular actions were at the discretion of the teacher and were not as demanding in terms of the overall workload. The following are two typical examples of these activities:
In order to understand this academic environment fully, the following section of this paper shall now expand on the emerging student learning environment and considers how this shapes the integration of blogs within this distinct language learning context.
Figure 4: Description of student activities
As previously mentioned, the second year students at the commencement of this module had no previous experience using blogs in their learning, even though every student had some form of recreational web presence on a social networking site. The distinct expressivist and personalised approach in this module was also a new departure for this group as these participants had been previously accustomed to more traditional, paper-based teaching methods. These particular features noted at the start of the semester are described in Figure 4 as 'existing ICT skills' and 'existing language learning strategies' and as such mark the starting point for acquiring proficiency in other areas. Examples as reported by students include the following:
The development of 'generic ICT skills' and 'personalised language learning strategies' is thus highlighted in Figure 4 as being representative of these objectives within the general learning context. It was intended by and large that the 12 week blogging experience would give the learners the necessary time to develop these particular ICT skills relative to the task. The basic mechanics of blogging, namely setting up the account and personalising it in terms of design and digital content, were regarded as tangible learning outcomes for the students involved. Thus, it is understandable that the relationship between the student and the teacher was recognised as a vital component as learners needed to feel free to approach with any relevant questions, no matter how basic the subject matter. The 'development of language learning strategies', as outlined here in Figure 4, relates directly to the mandatory, self-reflective approach which learners were obliged to take and as expected produced a wide variety of reactions unique to each student. This non-prescriptive style was thus integral to helping learners to establish their own assessment of their foreign language acquisition and ICT use. Indeed, this common thread served to contextualise the wide range of learner reflections. Interestingly, a number of students, for fear of straying from this context, referred frequently to making a conscious effort to blog L2 based content throughout the semester in order to maintain focus on the topic at hand. A brief sample of patterns which emerged from the data included the following:
As such, this emerging trend, which we have termed elsewhere 'negative integration' (Hourigan & Murray, 2006:313), is simply a natural progression of the student's growing awareness of their needs over this three month period. The main idea was to make learners aware of L2 blogging as a potentially helpful practice for their foreign language acquisition and to ensure that exposure to this task could be helpful for making future choices with regard to their studies. Hence having successfully completed this integration project, it was intended that students be more knowledgeable about their own particular learning styles and could potentially draw on this experience during their learning careers. The most crucial aspect of this process is guiding the initial inexperience of the learners from novice integrators to increasingly confidant and informed learners. This aspect shall be developed further in the final section of this paper.
One important caveat for any teacher considering using blogs in their teaching is the increased administrative load associated with the nature of this task. Consequently, the decision to implement such an exercise should not be taken lightly as learners will undoubtedly require some form of support over the course of the semester, be it either small scale technical and/or learner support. The reality of providing adequate integration guidance requires that the teacher monitor the class blogs from the beginning of semester, to make sure at least that learners are set up on their individual blog spaces. The demands of this role can vary depending on the student variables, but it is advisable that strategies to manage the administrative load are defined and set in place early on. What is important to ensure here is that students can embrace the creative component of the reflective blogging exercise without being overly weighed down by technical or affective integration issues.
In a sense, the teacher should ideally provide a structured and dependable guidance framework (as represented in Figure 5) which learners can access in times of self doubt or difficulty. This is particularly relevant as the bottom up exploitation of e-learning at third level makes it difficult to standardise student ICT skills for educational purposes. As pedagogical approaches depend on the preferred style of the individual teacher, there is no guarantee that learners can build on particular ICT skills from one semester to the next. Indeed the student cohort may be so diverse in its makeup that the teacher should typically expect to receive requests from some learners seeking clarification on some basic issues, e.g. attaching documents for uploading digital content.
Figure 5: Representation of the blog integration structure
When speaking of secondary level students, Prensky declares: "Our students' strengths lie in their ability to quickly master, use and apply technology, and in their fearlessness to try new things" (2007:46). In addition to Kennedy et al (2008), MacLean and Elwood (2009) also reported problematic variables (proficiency with technologies, tradition, willingness to use technology and gender) with so-called digital natives, concluding: "Use of the term 'Digital Native' should not be used as a blanket term for an entire generation". Indeed, with our Third Level students, such a term would be misleading. Granted that they do belong to the "Digital Native" generation (Prensky, 2007:40) through their extended and quite fearless (and sometimes reckless) use of Web 2.0 tools, yet as we have shown in this paper, many of our students still require explicit direction and validation in the writing of their own academic blogs.
When implementing reflective blogging practices within a distinct pedagogical environment, the most important aspect of the process is in directing the initial inexperience of the learners from neophyte integrators to increasingly confident and informed learners through a learning scaffold, as depicted in Figure 5. There may be some student negativity due to the mandatory nature of the blogging tasks. However, there is a widespread recognition amongst students that the objectives and the learning outcomes are valuable for their present and future multimodal learning needs.
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| Authors: Tríona Hourigan (corresponding author) is the ISSP Research Scholar, School of Languages, Literature, Culture, and Communication, Institute for the Study of Knowledge in Society, University of Limerick, Plassey, County Limerick, Ireland. Email: triona.hourigan@ul.ie
Liam Murray, School of Languages, Literature, Culture and Communication, University of Limerick, Plassey, County Limerick, Ireland. Email: liam.murray@ul.ie Please cite as: Hourigan, T. & Murray, L. (2010). Using blogs to help language students to develop reflective learning strategies: Towards a pedagogical framework. Australasian Journal of Educational Technology, 26(2), 209-225. http://www.ascilite.org.au/ajet/ajet26/hourigan.html |