APLING678 Week 5 - Writing

Writing with Social Tools

Guiding Questions:

• How has the nature of writing changed over the last couple of decades with the popularity of the Web 2.0?
• What are the similarities and differences between blogs and wikis and how do they impact pedagogical implementations in the language classroom?
• Is writing with social tools a necessary skill? Why or why not?

Readings: Complete the following readings for this week.

• Walker and White (2013) Chapter 5
• Elola and Oskoz (2011) Chapter 6 in Arnold & Ducate (eds.)

Substantive Post:

Week 5 Discussion Post       

With the popularity of Web 2.0, writing has become more collaborative and connective than it was even 20 years ago. It has also allowed for shorter writings to be published and for faster feedback to occur.

Blogs “gave people like you the power of the media and created a personal kind of news that appeals to a high number of small audiences” (Common Craft, 2007a). They give regular people a chance to be authors, with an audience. Bloggers can write about traveling, homemaking, decorating, cooking, or any number of other specialized areas, and someone will want to read what they have to say. Blogs almost instantly connect the writer with her audience. Compare it to a traditional print magazine: if a reader wants to respond to an article he has read in a magazine, he can write a letter to the editor, which might be published in the next month’s issue, but it would probably end there. The author of the original article might not even have a chance to respond. Now, with blogging, there can be instant and constant interaction between writer and reader. Language students who have blogged are aware of this sense of community; “their texts showed a higher amount of connective writing, meaning they had an audience in mind to interact with” (Raith, 2009). Personally, I started blogging in 2008. My blog is mostly a travel log, and it also includes sweet or funny stories about my children. It’s mostly a personal diary for myself with the added bonus of allowing extended family members a glimpse into our lives (without forcing them to sit and watch a slide show, like my parents did to family members after their travels). I don’t have enough of a following to feel the pressure that Joe expressed concerned about. I write for myself and for a few key family members. I can completely understand the therapeutic value of blogging, as described in Pamela Paul’s article. I was pleasantly surprised to read that “the commenters on the blogs were overwhelmingly supportive” (Paul p. 2).  I wonder if that holds true on a broader scope than this particular study. We, as teachers, need to consider a few questions if we ask our students to blog. Will their blogs be public, or only available to the class? Will comments be moderated by the student or by the teacher or not at all? It could be hard on a language student to put himself out there by trying to express himself in the target language only to receive negative comments.

Wikis are good for coordinating and organizing a group’s input (Common Craft, 2007b). Blogs may involve a community and create connections; wikis by definition are collaborative.  Gail, I appreciate your question about if wikis are too distracting and/or if some writers are too private for wikis. I think it depends on how the wikis are used. For some students, having others correct their language errors or delete something they have written might be difficult. If a student is writing a personal narrative or a fictional story, a blog might be a better vehicle than a wiki. If a group of students is doing a research project or reporting on anything factual, a wiki is probably a better vehicle than a blog. Personally, I would have a hard time with someone correcting or editing my work without asking me first. But “collaborative learning and collaborative writing are becoming sought-after skills for the job market,” (Elola & Oskoz p. 178) so it is important for our students to learn those skills. And in our increasingly global market, they need to learn those skills in multiple languages to be even more competitive in the job market. As teachers, it is our job to prepare the learners. It would be beneficial to offer an etiquette lesson on how to go about making revisions in a wiki without offending the original writer.

I have enjoyed looking at the blogs you all have written for ideas on how to use blogs in the language classroom. I would like to ask the group what ideas you have for using wikis in the classroom. I had one idea. When I taught German, after we learned foods and completed a unit on how to order in a restaurant, we would have a restaurant in our classroom – complete with menus, culturally appropriate foods, wait staff, customers, etc. If I were to do this again now, I would have the students use a wiki to organize and prepare for the “restaurant day”. Much like the friends preparing for a camping trip in the Wikis in Plain English video, my students could use this format to list (in the target language, of course), what is needed for the project, and to figure out who is bringing what.

Gail and Melissa, the plagiarism question jumped out at me, also. Since Google Translate was not prevalent (or perhaps did not yet exist) when I was teaching, I am just now starting to think about plagiarism in a new way. I think it is important to address it with students before it becomes an issue – before a student has been caught plagiarizing. A first step could be to have students do reverse translation activities with an online translator and discuss the results as a class. For example, find an article in a different language and have Google Translate put the article into your students’ native language. Notice how it doesn’t sound quite right, even if the individual words are correct. Point out that tools like Google Translate are just fast dictionaries and should be used to look up individual words, not to translate chunks of text.

Thank you, Gail, Melissa, and Joe, for getting the conversation off to a good start this week.

Outside Sources:

Common Craft. (2007b, May 29). Wikis in Plain English [Video file]. Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-dnL00TdmLY

Raith, T. (2009). The use of weblogs in language education. In M. Thomas Handbook of research on Web 2.0 and second language learning. Hershey, PA: Information Science Reference.