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A Blog about Blogs!

  

Holly Prather 



Writing can be frustrating for anyone, particularly for those operating in a second or foreign language. Understandably so, it is a difficult discipline to master. It can become especially so when the interference from the L1 requires a lot of effort to overcome. However, society measures intellectual aptitude through one’s ability to effectively express themselves in written communication, so improving such a skill, while strenuous, is necessary to succeed and thrive not only in academia, but in all spheres of life. 


That being said, it does not make writing any easier to teach. Trying to improve students’ skills in the three major areas of vocabulary, grammar, and style—all critical components of successful writing—can be challenging to adequately cover in a semester class without overwhelming or boring the students (Ferris and Hedgcock, 2014). How do you as the teacher take a difficult task and motivate your students to complete it without becoming demotivated yourself? Well, I don’t have the full answer for that (does anybody?) but the following are some tips to help facilitate and motivate student learning while easing the burden on you as the teacher. This particular blog post focuses on the medium of blogs (see what I did there!) as a means of improving writing fluency and lexical complexity. So onward to discover the wonderful benefits of blogging in an ESL or L2 classroom!



Forget about accuracy for a moment, just let them write


Writing in a journal or blog without worrying about the grammatical or stylistic accuracy of the writing can have tremendous benefits in fluency and lexical complexity (Fellner and Apple, 2006; Dizon and Thanyawatpokin, 2018). Removing the pressure of turning in a grammatically perfect text can free the student to think more about the ideas they want to communicate and the words they want to use. It’s a great confidence booster, particularly for beginner or low-motivated students. This can be easily implemented in the classroom by allowing students to free-write in a journal or blog for the first 20 minutes or so on topics chosen by you as the teacher. By recycling vocabulary throughout the prompts, students will gradually feel more at ease with their writing while at the same time improving its complexity. Fellner and Apple assert that the “focus on language meaning rather than language structure...resulted in overall improved writing fluency” (2006, 22-23). Blogs can also be a great way to gauge student progress without a lot of editing successive essay drafts which can be very time consuming for any teacher. 


Blogs can also be interactive, resulting in increased student engagement which has positive benefits for L2 writing skills. Students enjoy the ability to comment on work completed by their peers and voice their opinions. In fact, in a study comparing the use of Facebook and blogs as writing tools in a Japanese EFL classroom, the blog had significantly more interaction than Facebook, reiterating its importance and relevance as a great tool in the ESL or EFL classroom (Dizon and Thanyawatkpokin, 2018, 34). Student interaction on blog posts brings some dynamism to the typical essays or genre assignments written in composition classes. 


So ditch the grammar book occasionally, forget about accuracy, and just let your students write! You will be pleasantly surprised with the results! 




Sources:


Dizon, G., Thanyawatkpokin, B. (2018). Web 2.0 tools in the EFL classroom: Comparing the effects of Facebook and blogs on L2 writing and interaction. The EUROCALL Review, 26(1), 29-42. 


Fellner, T., Apple, M. (2006). Developing writing fluency and lexical complexity with blogs. The JALT CALL Journal, 2(1), 15-26. 


Ferris, D., Hedgcock, J. (2014). Teaching L2 composition: Purpose, process, and practice. Routledge, Taylor and Francis Group. 

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