BLOGGING IN ENGLISH TEACHING LEARNING PROSES

BLOGGING IN ENGLISH TEACHING LEARNING PROSES

Submitted as Partial Completion of the Requirement

for Internet for Language Teaching And Learning

Lecturer :

Kusumarasdyati, Ph.D.

Dr. Ali Mustofa, S.S., M.Pd.

By:

Eny Purwanti

08745078

UNIVERSITAS NEGERI SURABAYA

PROGRAM PASCA SARJANA

PROGRAM PENDIDIKAN BAHASA DAN SASTRA (RSBI)

2010

CONTENTS

PAGE

COVER....................................................................................................................... i

CONTENTS................................................................................................................ ii

PREFACE................................................................................................................... iii

INTRODUCTION...................................................................................................... 1

REVIEW OF STUDY................................................................................................ 3

WHAT IS BLOG?.......................................................................................... 3

CURRENT PROJECT

HOW TO USE BLOGS IN ENGLISH TEACHING LEARNING

PROCESS?..................................................................................................... 7

THE USE OF THE BLOG FOR TEACHING WRITING AT MY ENGLISH CLASS 10

CONCLUSION.......................................................................................................... 11

REFERENCES

Preface

Today we have entered globalization era, where the world has had technology development fast. Information and Communications Technology (ICT) has made all things easily, places and directions can be achieved easily. Communication and giving information are the most important things in our living. One of them is internet, in which it is as the most popular media to give information at this time, beside mass media like: newspaper, radio, and television that have been prepared before. It can not be avoided that the use of Information and Communications Technology became a part of our life.

Internet has developed in our lives. For many people, it is difficult to live without internet. Internet has big influence in their daily lives. There are many kinds of services have appeared in it, like: browsing, e-mail, chatting, blogging, video sharing, etc. With complicated communication technology, this paper is composed to give the readers information how to use internet, make e-mail, make blog that is used to show the compositions, and send them to the others, especially in education world. By internet facility, the data can be saved, taken and sent easily to everywhere in many ways, those data and information can be related easily and fast by using hyperlinks. Blog is one of the services in internet that most popular and used by many people, like: for private needed, company, or organization. In this case, it made blog is very easy, fast, and practice. In education environment, internet is not new thing which can be used as a tool of teaching, learning, and assessment for all lessons. The teacher can give their materials that are explained or assignments to their students by internet and the students will send back their answers by internet too. And in this paper the writer will try to explain the teaching learning process in English teaching by using blogs.

At last, the writer says thanks to your attention, as giving information in which communication by internet is very important at this time. The critiques and advices for improving this paper please send them directly to the writer by e-mail to: http://enypurwanti.blogspot.com.

Ponorogo, June 2010

The Writer

Eny Purwanti

BLOGGING IN ENGLISH TEACHING LEARNING PROCESS

Introduction

The role of Information and Communications Technology (ICT) in the curriculum is much more than simply a passing trend. It provides a real opportunity for teachers of all phases and subjects to rethink fundamental pedagogical issues alongside the approaches to learning that students need to apply in classrooms.

The use of computer in educational world is not new for us. American and Europe countries have used it for a long time. In educational context, it is not only able to help management of assignments, but also as a tool for assessment, teaching and learning for all lessons. The aspect of technology has been combined in school curriculum as a trying to improve students willing to technology development. In the Government Law No. 19, 2005 about Education National Standard stated that in the curriculum consists of science and technology materials. It means that for applying science and technology, to develop competency and skill in teaching learning process, the curriculum will support students and teachers to follow and use the development of science and technology correctly. The school culture has to be changed from something that based on the memory, to the activities that consist of knowledge, thinking, and creativity that uses new technology. With technology standard becoming an integral part of students’ education, teachers are more enthusiastic than ever to learn new technologies and methods. Teachers who have brought technology into their classrooms are aware that it provides an opportunity to differentiate instruction and change their classrooms into dynamic learning environments.

The technology’s use in the classroom can have an additional of positive influence on student learning when the learning objectives are clearly articulated prior to the technology’s use. Applying effectively of technology implementation is not only to increase student learning, understanding, and achievement but also to improve arguments of motivation to learn, encourages collaborative learning, and supports the development of critical thinking and problem-solving skills. The usage of computer in teaching learning process includes several applications, like: spreadsheet, multimedia, and internet.

Internet stands for Interconnected Networking. The function and the use of internet have been known exactly to help in management of National Education system, especially in teaching learning process that conclude teachers, students, parents and scientists. It is a network of networks that consists of millions of private, public, academic, business, and government networks of local to global scope that are linked by a broad array of electronic and optical networking technologies.

Internet is way of communication that emerges in early 20th century. Internet now builds such as virtual world in real world. Internet connects every node around the world in just a one-clicked on our mouse. Every person uses the internet for updating their life. There is so much function of internet for scholar. First is internet as the effective library, second internet as the effective communication media. And the third is internet as the workplace. The most effective function of the internet for scholar is as the literature function. We know that internet is virtual storage media. People can store their file in internet and the others can take it by downloading it. No exception for any literature that useful for college tasks. Scholar can take the literature such as e-book, paper or image or any digital media just by one click. This way is more effective than search for the literature in physically media, like book in library or image in newspaper. The second is internet function as the scholarships storehouse. We know that internet is communication media that connect every node in this world. So, based on this, many institution and foundation submit their scholarship program in internet in purpose it can reach every people in the world. The scholar doesn’t have to waiting only for the scholarship from government because there is a lot of scholarship kind now in internet. And we can apply it just by one click. The third is internet as the work place for the scholar. So many scholars take a part-time job from internet business. They usually make such a portal or website in internet. They create a unique page to flirt the visitor their page, that uniqueness like making some journal, web-blog or music shared page media. Finally, we can say that the internet is very useful for the scholar based on the function. The scholar can use internet for their academic, social, and economic life.

Communication activity in internet like e-mail will be able to prepare job vacancies for students that using communication relation process absolutely. Teachers can send feedback to students through e-mail any time, whether in or out of school. Even students without home computer access can set up a Web-based e-mail account through a number of free services such as Gmail, Yahoo! mail, Hotmail, and Lycos that they can access through a classroom or computer library.

In internet, there are many kinds of materials and millions numbers that always increase from time to time. These materials conclude articles, graphics, video, audio, magazines, games, projects, etc. There are more than eight thousands electronic discussion collections. These collections may consist of some people, so many people will talk about the same materials, include school material. The teacher has to understand that: 1) Internet is as resource and a tool in learning activity, so it has to be arranged explicitly by the teacher, that it can be used maximally. 2) Computer and internet don’t change teacher’s role. In the other hand, teacher is able to improve their knowledge and competence, especially in IT area. 3) The using of computer and internet can minimize teacher and students’ job volume, although each activity can be done simply, accurately, and systematically. 4) Internet is very useful for teachers, students and parents especially in facing the IT development and globalization era.

All those easies above can be applied in teaching learning process. The teachers have to choose application that suitable used wisely. So the arrangement of activity neatly is very important, that students can use internet maximally and optimally. All those applications may be used as main source or tool which is integrated in teaching learning process continuously. By internet facility, the data can be saved, taken and sent easily everywhere in many ways, data and information can be sent easily and fast by using hyperlinks.

What is blog?

According to Bread Hill (2006) a blog, short for “Web log,” is a Web site in which items are posted on a regular basis and usually displayed in reverse chronological order. However, people who write blogs are called bloggers — never Webloggers. Blogging is a verb; Weblogging is the utterance of an ill-informed person. Note that a blog is a Web site, not an entry on that Web site. Some new bloggers say, “I wrote five blogs today.” Actually they wrote five entries in their blog. So, what distinguishes a Weblog from other sites? Weblogs have a certain type of software running in the background. This answer might seem obscure, but that software is the hidden key to blogs. In fact, blog software is so useful that it has spawned the blogging revolution with its millions of new sites. So what is this powerhouse that lies behind blogs, and how does it make blogs different from other sites?

Blogs are a type of website that allow for the publication of text, images and sound files.(Marie N.L. and Regine Hampel, 2007:146) Blogs are web logs or journals, posted to a website where they can be seen by anyone. (Erben T.,Ben R., & Castaneda M.,2009:136) Like other media, blogs often focus on a particular subject, such as education, technology, or politics. However, blogs differ from other types of Web sites in that moderators frame the discussions and then invite readers to reply to posts. This works best in a written format, although blogs have the additional capability to display graphics and even video. The manager or facilitator of a blog can decide if others will be allowed to comment on postings to the blog. If you want your classroom blog to be interactive, allowing student input and feedback, you will need to enable these comments. Remember, though, that blogs open to public postings sometimes receive inappropriate comments from unaccountable sources (online vandalism).

There are many uses of blog like: 1) Telling about ideas and creativities in the form of writing that can be published in blog site and read by other people. 2) As a tool to study computer and internet. 3) As a tool to write something like article of tutorial, education, science, etc. 4) As a chance of diary in which we can write all activities, events, experiences, stories, etc. 5) For adding friends, if your postings are interested, your blog will be visited by them, automatically you will get new friends. 6) It can be a business field that will get more money. So in the blog will be consisted of articles, diary, new news, and business notes.

There are many cases that must be avoided in writing in a blog, like: doing copy paste from other blog, to write something that relates with SARA, pornography, etc.

If we want to make a blog, we have to fulfill the requirements like: 1) Having e-mail address like, yahoo, gmail, or hotmail. 2) Having computer that is connected to internet, 3) Having competency to operate computer and internet. In Blogger site, there are many advantages, like: 1) Dashboard is seen more simply and understood easily. 2) To support Indonesia. 3) To change blog colors and letters with edit Font and Color. 4) To add gadget with more choices. 5) To edit blog appearance by editing HTML, or CSS. 6) It can place advertisement or business banner by adding code HTML. 7) To place template from other site. 8) To do posting by e-mail.

Furthermore, as the manager of the blog, you can screen student comments before you allow them to be posted. Inappropriate blog postings are not as big a problem as you might think, provided that you stipulate students use their actual names as their user names; most students do not want their name on an offensive posting for all the school and their parents to see. Here is the crucial power of blogs: They make it easy to frequently add content to a Web site. Blog programs and ready-to-use blogging services cut out the laborious and technical traditional process of building a Web site and adding pages to it. Creating a blog page doesn’t need to be any harder than writing and sending an e-mail or posting a message to an online discussion forum. In fact, these three tasks — blogging, e-mailing, and posting a message — follow the same basic three steps:

1. Go to a Compose screen.

2. Type something brilliant (or not).

3. Click a Send (or Post) button.

Blogging software encourages frequent updating of the Web site. And frequent, easy updates result in the following typical blog characteristics:

_ Fresh content on the site: Many bloggers update their content every day or several times during the day. Even weekly updates result in a fresher Web site than most nonblog personal sites.

_ Personal content: When given the opportunity to self-publish on a daily basis, most people reach into their own lives for content. Many blogs are like personal, public diaries.

_ Newsy content: Other bloggers take a less personal approach, keying their updated content to news items or pages on other sites. These blogs can still have a personal slant, especially if the blogger offers comments on the news or outside pages. These commentary blogs typically use lots of links to those other pages so visitors can see the source material as well as the commentary. One aspect of blog software that influences the practical definition of blogs is that new content is usually dated. Every new page created by the blogger is stamped with the date and time that it’s added, supporting the idea that Weblogs are online diaries. In fact, many news stories about Weblogs define them exactly that way, as online diaries or online journals. Purely personal blogs usually are online diaries, intended to be read by a few friends and family. Less personal examples of the blogging genre, such as those written by journalists, might be called professional diaries. A connection exists between journaling and journalism. Professional blog journalism has a personal quality, and personal blog journaling sometimes has a professional quality.

Many types of blogs have been created, with many unimagined types to come. Following is a list of blog types an active reader can easily find. Weblogs have no official categories or designations, so I use the following names descriptively:

_ Personal diaries: This is probably the most common blog type. Many individuals start blogs without knowing exactly what they’ll do with them; the pleasure of self-publishing is enough by itself. Visitors to these blogs are often greeted with content along the lines of “Here’s what I did today.”

_ Professional diaries: These sites are better known than personal diaries, but scarcer. More and more professionals are choosing to maintain blogs alongside their actual jobs. These include journalists, who get lots of publicity for softening their objectivity in the more opinionated blog space, when their publishers allow them to do so. Blogging can turn a journalist into a columnist, and some newspapers and magazines forbid their writers doing so.

_ Institutional blogs: Companies are jumping on the bandwagon with various results. Blogging, though versatile, is a fragile genre of online publication. Inauthentic voices, or any bogus attempt to be cool, reveal themselves immediately in the blog format.

_ Topical blogs: Blogs exist on nearly every subject under the sun, including politics, technology, Starbucks, sports teams, music, cars, and all manner of current events. Topical blogs range from hobby sites to full-fledged professional ventures supported by advertising. Political blogs hit the mainstream in 2004, leading up to the American presidential election.

_ MP3 blogs: These musical journals include actual music in the form of downloadable MP3 songs. In many cases, the recordings are sent to the blogs by independent musicians hungry for exposure.

_ Fiction blogs: Not many blogs are complete fabrications, but I’ve run across some entertaining examples. One beauty was the fictional blog of Darth Vader (darthside.blogspot.com), which revealed a previously unimagined sensitive side of the great dark lord. That blog was discontinued, leaving many mourning readers in its wake, and the author started a serialized blognovel called Simon of Space (simonofspace.blogspot. com).

Entries, posts, indexes, and archives

In the context of blogging, content management almost always means organizing the site by backwards chronology. In this way, your most recent writing appears first. As visitors continue reading your updates, they work backwards in time. Each piece of content is called an entry. When you write a blog, you post entries, and those posted entries are sometimes called posts. (The word post derives from Internet message boards, where online communities chat by means of publicly posted messages.) Each posted entry is stamped with a date and (usually) time. The front page of the blog contains recent entries, with the most recent at the top. Many blogs are organized with big daily headers that group each day’s posts. Blog software makes easy business of posting entries. The interface is usually similar to the Compose screen you use for e-mail. You write in that screen, and then click a button marked Post or Post Entry. The software uploads the entry to the blog, putting it above previous entries on the home page, and assigning it a date and time stamp. The software also assigns the entry its own page, so that each entry has a dedicated URL (Web address). In some instances, bloggers make the software put short entry excerpts on the home page (called the index page), saving the entire entry for the dedicated page. With that arrangement, readers can skim short bits of many entries on the index page, clicking through to a dedicated entry page when they want to read an entire post. Even in blogs where the entire entry is published on the index page, a dedicated page is created — that unique URL enables bloggers to promote individual entries by sharing links to those entries. Creating a series of dedicated pages is how the blog software maintains an archive of everything written.

Here is a summary of the general process of blogging:

1. The blogger writes a blog entry.

2. The blogger posts the new entry.

3. The blog software uploads the new entry and fits it into the Weblog chronologically. Part or all of the entry is placed on the blog’s index page (the home page of the site), and the entire entry is also archived on its own page with a unique URL.

4. Visitors see the index page first, where they can skim recent entries in reverse chronological order. They can click through to individual entries on individual pages.

Common blog elements

Chronological entries and archives would be enough for a basic blog, and indeed, a few blogs eliminate all other elements from their pages. (See the Russell Beattie Notebook at www.russellbeattie.com.) Most blogs, though, incorporate these standard features:

_ Author byline: A byline above (or below) each entry is less important if you’re the blog’s only writer than in group blogs. Still, many blogs carry that byline as a default setting in the blog software.

_ Permalink: Short for “permanent link,” this link takes the visitor from the index page to the entry’s unique page. Figure 1-8 illustrates a permalink below a blog entry.

_ Blogroll: The blogroll is not a requirement, but it is a tradition to list the blogger’s favorite blogs in a sidebar. The blogroll is usually common to every page of the blog, so visitors can see your favorite blog destinations no matter where they enter your blog. Blogrolls make the blogosphere somewhat incestuous, with many topical blogs all linking to each other. Having one’s blog included in a high-profile blogroll is an honor and can deliver lots of traffic to a previously little-known blog.

_ Categories: Some blog programs allow the blogger to assign categories to blog entries. These categories are listed in a sidebar, so that visitors can restrict their reading to a category of interest. It’s not unusual for one entry to be tagged in multiple categories.

_ Comments: Comments are written by visitors to your blog and are presented below your entry on that entry’s unique page. On the index page, a Comments link sends visitors to that unique page, scrolled down to the first comment. Many blog programs allow the comments function to be turned off, so visitors cannot talk back. Some blog experts believe that the presence of comments is a defining feature of a Weblog. I disagree with this restrictive view; I have operated nocomment blogs, and I visit some wonderful blog products in which readers can only read, not talk. But it is true that the blogosphere would be fundamentally altered if there were no comments anywhere. Comments are a crucial part of what I call the macrologue — far-flung group discussions across many blogs.

_ TrackBacks: TrackBacks are related to comments but are trickier to understand. For now, know that TrackBacks offer a way to put a link to your blog entry on someone else’s blog. TrackBacks link blogs together in the macrologue.

How to use Blogs in English teaching learning process?

Brown (2001) stated that an English teacher should bear in mind the three principles in teaching a foreign or second language, namely: the cognitive, the affective, and the linguistic principles. English lesson gives students communication competence in English, orally and written. Beside that English gives students communication competence in daily life suitable with globalization era, and to develop communication in higher level. There are four skills in English, like: listening, speaking, reading, and writing. In order to be successful in a school, all students need to become proficient in academic literacy, in which, it provides a description of academic English that includes a phonological, lexical (vocabulary), grammatical (syntax, morphology), sociolinguistic, and discourse (rhetorical) component.

The use of technology in English classroom is becoming very important, and it offers new ways for practicing English language. It means that all students practice in all of the four main language skills: listening, speaking, reading and writing. There are many ways to teach English by computer and internet in blogging site, like multiply, wordpress, blogger, livejournal, and blogsome. In this paper, the writer will explain about English teaching in blogger site. It is a variety in teaching learning process, because they need something new in it. Teacher can send his or her material by e-mail, and students will do the same activities by e-mail too. It is very hard for them to do these activities, because they have to have basic skills in playing computer and internet. Beside that, they have to prepare equipment like computer and modem inside and outside the class. Actually the internet can make distance short, and the activities can be done easily, but it needs much more expenditure or fund. For example in writing activity, the teacher can do posting in blogger site and send it to each student. How is the process?

The first step in blogging, every body (teacher and students) have to register in Blogger. The steps to register in Blogger:

1. Open address http://www.blogger.com.

2. For using English, so in button language, choose English, and then click CREATE A BLOG.

3. Insert data, then type verification word that the same as looked in verification picture that appears, then give sign in “I accept the terms of service”. Then click CONTINUE.

4. Insert term of blog and your address, and then click CONTINUE.

5. Choose term of blog that you like, so click in picture then click CONTINUE.

6. For starting blogging, click START BLOGGING.

If they have had blog address, then they will write their materials, assignments, or answers by making the posting. The steps in making posting are:

1. Doing login by inserting e-mail address and password, and then click SIGN IN.

2. Choose blog, and click NEW POST.

3. In posting page, insert title, type something you need, and then insert labels for this post.

4. If they want to publish it, click Publish Post, if they want to save it without publish click Save Now, and if they want to review click Review.

Sometimes the teacher and students are not sure with their writing. If they want to edit their posting, they can do changing or improving the posting that has been done, and its steps are:

1. In posting area, click DASHBOARD. (in above right side)

2. In DASHBOARD consist of facilities like:

- New Post, making new posting.

- Edit Post: to edit writing that was made or published.

- Setting: for doing many arrangements like to change blog term, date format, zone time, etc.

- Design: to arrange blog, like adding or moving gadget, to edit header, etc. To edit the posting before, click Edit Post.

3. Click Edit.

4. The writing can be changed, click PUBLISH POST.

Sometimes they want to complete their self data, they can upload photo in which it can appear in dashboard and in blog site. Beside that they can complete self data, and its steps are:

1. In dashboard, click Edit Photo.

2. Edit Photo will be opened.

3. Complete yourself data. For entering photo, click Browse, and then look for photos in the computer, and then click SAVE PROFILE.

4. For seeing the change, click View Updated Profile.

For doing arrangement like to change blog theme, forms of date, time, etc by using the next steps:

1. Click Setting.

2. Doing many kinds of arrangement, and then click SAVE SETTING.

They can arrange the position of page element in blog, like moving gadget, become header, navbar, etc, and its steps are:

1. In Dashboard page click DESIGN.

2. They can move gadget, for example Archive Blog Move to above Follower, just move (drag and drop).

3. After moving gadget click SAVE. For looking the changing click View Blog.

If they are boring with their blog appearance, they can change the blog theme that they used. Blogger prepared many kinds of theme choices that can be used. Its steps like:

1. In dashboard page, click Design, then in the bottom click New Template.

2. Then will be opened many choices of blog theme.

3. Choose the theme that they want, for example Denim, then choice Denim then click Save Template.

4. To see the changing, click View Blog.

Beside that if they want to change letters and color they have to apply the steps like:

1. In blog page click customize, if in dashboard click Design, then in bottom click Font or Color.

2. It will be opened Font and Color page.

3. They can change color.

4. If finished click Save Change. For looking changing click View Blog.

After finishing in posting about writing if they want to do Sign Out or out from their Blogger, they will do steps like:

1. In blog page, click Sign Out.

2. For closing Blogger site click X.

If they want to Sign In or enter to their Blogger, they will do the steps like:

1. Open browser program in your computer, then enter to the address http://www.blogger.com

2. Insert user name and password, then click Sign In,

3. If they want to open their blog or other person want to visit your blog, open browser program in your computer, then insert in address in your blog, for example http://only1.blogspot,com, then click Enter.

After finishing their activities, they can measure their competence by seeing the result of their activities, success or not in doing teaching and learning process by using technology.

Here are the criteria and the rules of assessment :

No.	Description	Criteria of Assessment	Score
1.	Dictation	Perfect Almost Perfect Imperfect	25 20 10
2	Grammatical	Perfect Almost Perfect Imperfect	25 20 10
3	Vocabulary	Perfect Almost Perfect Imperfect	25 20 10
4	Paraphrasing	Perfect Almost Perfect Imperfect	25 20 10
TOTAL SCORE			100

HOW TO MAINTAIN CONTACT WITH STUDENTS THROUGH BLOG

I realize that when I use blog to teach at class, it will minimize the face to face meeting with my students. The impact is that students will have individual behavior because the will be less of interaction. But, actually it can be avoided if we can maintain them to open internet and keep in touch with teachers and other students periodically and regularly. For example everyday, at least they must be online once a day.

CONCLUSION

Teaching and learning English by using technology is very important for teachers and students. It is as a variety of teaching learning process in which interaction is done in the classroom only. But by using technology teaching learning process can be done outside the class, the teachers send their materials by e-mail to students. It is hard for teachers and students, because they have to have basic skills and equipment that teachers and students need in order to start using technology in their teaching and learning. There are many ways to activities by e-mail, but Blogger is a general one. They can make many varieties in their writings by using Blogger. And there are many steps to make activities in blogging to be successful.

REFERENCES

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Pitler, H., Hubbel, E.R., Kuhn, M. & Malenoski, K. 2007. Using Technology with Classroom Instruction that Works. USA, ASCD publications.

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