Blogging

Liz Katherine Díaz Recursos didácticos apoyados en TIC's Mayo 2012. Blogging as a Way to Foster EFL Writing. Blogging as a Way to Foster EFL Writing is a research project carried out at Distrital University by Luz Mary Quintero. She worked in alliance with a university in Canada on how to foster foreign language writing by using a web blog as means of communication between Colombian students and Canadian’s. The university in Canada created an Internet platform in which students were provided with a personal blog, a community blog and a debate blog. The idea was to have the students write about their personal interests on the personal blog. On the community blog, they should comment on topics of common interest. And, on the debate blog, students were required to post their opinion on a specific question that a teacher proposed. The author provides the theoretical grounds to this project. First, she highlights the importance of learning to express your ideas and thoughts by writing in a second language. Throughout time, teachers have approached writing as a way to strengthen the grammar aspect of the language, which has long since been the main focus of foreign language classes. Having said this, teachers pay way more attention to form and use of structures, than to content and the way ideas are put together. Writing is one of the most complex tasks in any language, first or second, hence, teachers should level this skill up to speaking or listening, which have been taken more seriously in the classroom. The importance of feedback is also mentioned in the article. There are many theories in line with this topic. Some argue the importance of correcting content over grammar or vice versa. However, Luz Quintero presents a study done with a control group and an experimental group. The results showed that correcting structure and content alongside benefits our students more than working on either aspect alone. The weblog project was carried out with eight people from second semester of B.A in Language teaching with emphasis on Spanish and English. She reports the students were enthusiastic about the possibility of communicating with native speakers because their writings would have a real communicative goal. This need to make themselves understand by their Canadian peers pushed the Colombian students to elaborate more on their writings and try to organize their ideas as clear as possible. The teacher's role was that of an aide. She corrected students’ mistakes and gave feedback on structures and content. At the

Liz Katherine Díaz Recursos didácticos apoyados en TIC's Mayo 2012. end, Quintero announced that the students had greatly improved their writing skills and had been able to engage themselves in discussions and conversations with their Canadian peers. In some cases, they went beyond the assignment and kept talking to these students after the project was over. We live in a world of technological extensions. Our reality is the one that Sci-fi movies dreamt of a few years ago. Technology is everywhere. It invades our public and private spaces. Based on this, I consider, technology should be used and abused in schools. Internet makes our job much easier. If a person wants to learn a foreign language, the ideal way is through real interaction with the culture and the language. The best part is that in order to achieve this, we don't need to travel. We can chat, e-mail, skype, facebook, tweet...the possibilities go beyond our thoughts. We ought to bring these technological tools into the classroom and engage the students in meaningful activities that will foster their skills because it's something meaningful to them, something they can relate to. Meaningful learning implies bringing the outside world into the classroom. The use of ICT's is a great opportunity for students to be able to communicate with real people, not teachers. There are various ways to do that. People no longer have to travel to be able to learn a foreign language and master the communicative skills. Teachers can foster students' listening skills thought a tv show, the news, cartoons; writing skills through e-mails with native speakers, posting their comments on a debate wall on facebook or any other social site; speaking could be improved by means of listening and repeating tv shows, podcasts. Reading the news, trend articles, or any piece of information that interests our students can be a way to foster their reading skill. All of these activities help enormously to enrich our students' vocabulary. Luz Quintero showed how students improved their writing skills because they were motivated. Assessments in the classroom should be meaningful ones that relate to the reality of our world. However, it's not an easy task. Teachers should be alert not to cross the thin line between the use of ICT's to foster a skill, and the use of ITC's as an end in itself. Bringing ITC's to the classroom doesn’t seem to be an easy task for teachers, who often end up using them as the goal rather than as a

Liz Katherine Díaz Recursos didácticos apoyados en TIC's Mayo 2012. resource. In schools, we find different attempts to bring ICT's into the classroom, but the technology usually ends up being the main actor on the scenery. How can teachers take advantage of the ICT's in the classroom as a facilitator in a foreign language learning process without turning them into the center of the class?