Ways to use blogs in language teaching:

After investing some focus on creating a blog and discussing its benefits in language teaching, I think it's time now to think how to use it; the issue that I've been thinking throughout the previous days. From reading some materials, the discussion taken place here in Nicenet and my own reflection, I can state now some ways on how I intend to use blogging.
* Project work: the students would carry their project on collaboratively. As a teacher, this allows you to observe the learners' work in progress and how each member of the group participates in the project. It would help you know who has done what and when. Doing projects in a blog would also help you guide you students and give them feedback in time. Your students wouldn't need to wait until they meet you in class to hand their production in or to get feedback. This could be done at any time.
* Assignments/Homework: I can post on the blog tasks that my students have to do. By doing so, you push them get to the blog on a regular basis especially if they know they are seriously required to do the homework. Another advantage is that you save time in class for other activities. Homework correction could also be carried out in the blog by giving feedback and encouraging peer correction. Here, there is a risk of discouraging students but, I think, to escape this, the teacher may keep a list of common mistakes and post them to the blog without referring to the students who have done them. If a feedback is recommended to a particular learner, I'd rather react by sending an email or correct him/her face-to-face.
* Thematic discussions: discussing topics on blogs is an excellent approach especially if the English curriculum is theme-based. Discussions could be stimulated in the blog where all the learners take part exposing their ideas freely. The role of the teacher is to provoke discussions, encourage the students to participate and keep the discussions on the thread.
* E-portfolio: Every student would get a blog as a portfolio. This would facilitate assessment as it helps you have a clear idea about the work of the students and it is not demanding.
* Practice with the four skills: A blog could be a fertile land for developing language skills either separated or integrated.
- Reading: The teacher post texts for the students to read and related comprehension exercises.
- Writing: The blog could be a room to practice all types and forms of writing. The teacher might focus on process writing, productive writing or informal writing while discussion and commenting…
- Speaking: The blog could be used to project audios and videos done by the students. Instead of doing it in the classroom, a student or a group of students would be asked to make a record of them giving a presentation or making an interview and upload it to the blog. Their peers should be prompted to respond by asking them to make summaries, give opinion, ask the presenters questions and so on.
- Listening/watching: The teacher might upload audios and videos with listening comprehension or “watching” comprehension tasks. Note that the materials could be done by the students themselves.
* Games: I don’t know if the blog would support installing certain interactive games. Something I have to discover! But there are games that are very simple to display such as crossword puzzles, riddles… Remember that games are so much motivating to all types of learners.
Here is another point I'd like to add to the list above.
* Webquest: It is an inquiry-oriented task format. the students could be asked questions that they have to answer, but they have to do many readings through moving from a hyperlink to another till they get the answer to the question. The inquiry might be adjusted to the level of the students, but the answer should not be somehow challenging by making the learners move from a link to another and read and read. For further reading about webquest, I suggest the link: www.webquest.org

Blogging as an "Art" & error correction: Reflections and questions.

I have gone through all the postings above and found them all interesting. There are some points that attracted me most and I’d like to comment on them.
In her rich writing, Susana mentioned the idea that blogging could be considered as an art. What makes a blog more attractive than another? What skills can help make you blog be more appealing? Is it its look? Or its content? Or both? You should really be an artist to make your students be interested in your blog!
I have used some other interactive web tools in my classes such as Moodle and Second Life, but never a blog. The first time I heard about blogging was with my students some years ago, but I knew that they didn’t and still don’t use them for studies. Almost every student has got a blog where he/she posts pictures, videos and some texts written in very informal styles. In my social context, students/teenagers like to keep their blogs as “a secret” especially from the adults. What I’d deduce from this is that, technically speaking, I wouldn’t have many problems with my students as far as blogging is concerned, but the great challenge is in fact how to make my blog cater for them and thereby attract and motivate them to interact, write and participate. What kind of blogs do teenagers like most? Surely both the content and the appearance concern them. Are there any practical tips that could make the students take part blogging because they like it and not because it is a part of the class assessment? When forced, learners do less and they do much better when they feel free doing a thing they like.
Hala nicely debated the idea of focusing on content or form. She clearly stated that she opts for content on the first rank rather than form. I think that the learners would rather debate ideas and would be pleased to publish them, but what might prevent them from not doing so is making mistakes. And if these corrected publically, no one would post anything. The learners should then be encouraged by stimulating interesting topics to them, but how could mistakes be corrected then?

Blogging for English Language Teaching: Summary of the article.

• What is it? A blog or a weblog looks like an online journal to publish the students writing on the web. It is very simple to create and manage. It also has the facility to display audios, videos and pictures that could be exploited to teach languages.
• Types of blogs: Aaron Campbell (2003) distinguishes between three types of blogs that could be used in ELT:
- The tutor blog: managed by the teacher and the content is limited to classroom matters (tasks, syllabus, homework...).
- The class blog: collaboratively managed by the teacher and the students and could be used for extracurricular activities.
- The learner blog: More demanding for the teacher to create and moderate, but also more beneficial. Each student is given an individual blog where to post writings of his interests and comment on his peers’.
A combination of the three blogs could also be used.
• Why blog?
- To provide a real audience for student writing.
- To provide extra reading practice for students.
- As online student learner journals that can be read by their peers.
- To guide students to online resources appropriate for their level.
- To increase the sense of community in a class.
- To encourage shy students to participate.
- To stimulate out-of-class discussion
- To encourage a process-writing approach.
- As an online portfolio of student written work.
- To help build a closer relationship between students in large classes.
• The start: There are many sites that offer free blogs such as www.blogger.com
• Tips for managing learner blog settings
- Use “settings” or“Site Feed” in Blogger to be the administrator of the learner blog and to receive a notifying email whenever you students publish on their blogs.
- By turning the “Comments” feature on, the students can comment on their peers’ writings.
• How to keep the students interested?
- Respond to student posts quickly.
- Ask questions.
- Create stimulus for writing.
- Encourage the students to read and respond.
- Consider writing to the blog as part of your class assessment.
- Encourage the students to post their writing homework on the blog instead of only giving it to the teacher.
• Some ideas for activities:
- Mystery guest
- Project work
- International link-ups
- Photoblog.
Source: http://www.teachingenglish.org.uk/think/articles/blogging-elt

Reflections on creating a blog.

Of course this is not the first time I create a blog. I've already had a similar academic one in Blogger http://mernaoui.blogspot.com, but this is the first time I create it with a systematic reflection on what I’ve learned while creating it and how good it is for a language class. The findings are great.
Creating a blog is not difficult. It only takes a few minutes to have it done. It is free and all you need is to have access to the internet. You don’t need to excel at information technology to moderate your blog. You can post, edit, add, delete with very simple clicks.
I think the blog would be a good place for language learning. Its features offer a diversity of facilities that would both motivate the learners and enhance their learning. Apart from texting, pictures and videos could also be displayed. This means that thanks to the blog, the target language could be more contextualised and the students could be easily exposed to authentic language. A thing that would not be such easy to do in class because of the daily physical constraints we face.
As an interactive web tool, the blog could also be a fertile platform for educators to improve the students’ writings and stimulate discussions. With the posting possibility, all the students can take part to enrich ongoing discussions, expose and exchange ideas.