Reflection on blogging

      Blogging is a new trend in a student-centered learning approach “with lots of student-student interaction” (Montgomery, 2015, p. 1). Although students treat it differently, the majority understands its importance and benefits. The main advantage of blogging is not only in complementing to the knowledge received from essay writing, but in a unique experience that leads to developing new skills and expanding the existing ones. In this reflection, I will present why blogging is different and what issues students may face at the beginning.

      From my perspective, blogging differs from essay writing in several ways. First, topics are usually to be chosen by students. It forces them to be more attentive to and stay focused on the topic even outside the class. Second, blogs tend to be less formal than essays allowing students to expand their boundaries and let their imagination and fantasy to spread out. Third, public posting implies more communication and helps to get rid of shyness (Warschauer, 1997, p. 473). As for me, getting positive comments helped me to realize my potential and become more confident in writing. Fourth, blogging is the best way for discussing topics of the current interest. Students of one class can cover more information than a single instructor and promptly share the best and most interesting findings with classmates. I believe that all the factors mentioned above lead to the increased responsibility of students for own creature. Analyzing these differences, I would say that writing essays is about structure, while blogging is about style.

      Despite all the advantages of blogging, at the beginning students may struggle with choosing a topic, planning, and lack of feedback from the instructor (Montgomery, 2015, p.4). It is important to understand that it is a natural process due to adaption and leaving the “comfort zone” of academic essays (Montgomery, 2015, p.4). From my experience, choosing a topic ceased to be a problem when I started to pay more attention on news from the internet and topics from other classes. Once you adjust to this scheme, interesting topics will appear constantly.

      To sum up, blogging is an effective tool in developing students’ writing, creativeness and responsibility at the same time. Despite significant differences from academic writing, the increasing popularity of blogs can only prove that students need blogging skills. As for the instructors, blogging can become one of the best ways to achieve a more student-centered learning in classes.

References

 Montgomery, D.P. (2015, April). Did you read my new post?: Improving autonomy, English and engagement through class blogs. Paper presented at The International Conference for Building Cultural Bridges, Suleyman Demirel University. Kaskelen, Kazakhstan: ICBCB

Warschauer, M. (1997). Computer‐mediated collaborative learning: Theory and practice. The Modern Language Journal, 81(4), 470-481.