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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