چکیده:
Employing an explanatory sequential design, the present study investigated the effect of English as a Foreign Language (EFL) blog-mediated writing instruction on the students’ learner autonomy. A number of 46 learners who were the students of two intact classes were randomly assigned to control and experimental groups. Over a 16-week semester, the control group students (n=21) were taught based on regular in-class writing instruction and the students in the experimental group (n=25) made use of blogs in addition to the traditional in-class writing instruction. The data were collected through administering a learner autonomy instrument, consisting of metacognitive, cognitive, social, and affective components, and conducting semi-structured interviews. The results of both quantitative and qualitative data revealed that the blog-mediated writing instruction contributed to enhancing learner autonomy of the participants. More specifically, the students who experienced blog-mediated writing activities showed improvement in metacognitive and cognitive components of learner autonomy. The findings offer significant implications for EFL teachers.
خلاصه ماشینی:
Abstract Employing an explanatory sequential design, the present study investigated the effect of English as a Foreign Language (EFL) blog-mediated writing instruction on the students’ learner autonomy.
The results of both quantitative and qualitative data revealed that the blog-mediated writing instruction contributed to enhancing learner autonomy of the participants.
More specifically, the students who experienced blog-mediated writing activities showed improvement in metacognitive and cognitive components of learner autonomy.
g. , Sturm, Kennell, McBride, & Kelly, 2009).
A text-based online environment that allows for embedding links to other online resources, blogs have been claimed to provide a real audience to write for, provide further writing practice to students, create a sense of community among students, enhance a sense of ownership, facilitate feedback on the writing process, stimulate out-of-class discussion, encourage more student participation, and encourage teacher-student interaction and peer communication (Aydin, 2014; Campbell, 2003, 2005, Lee, 2011).
A recently burgeoning body of literature on the role of technology in L2 language learning has documented significant findings verifying the beneficial role of technological devices in enhancing learner autonomy (Benson, 2004; Lee, 2014; Murphy, 2006; Murray, 1999; Pinkman, 2005; Smith & Craig, 2013; 1409.
Technology-mediated language learning, which offers further flexibility and freedom in the choice of materials and topics, fosters autonomous learning if technology possibilities are developed in line with suitable educational considerations and if technology has the capacity to assign new roles to both learner and teacher in an increasing collaborative learning scenario (Murray, 1999).
Blogging used by the experimental group allowed for asynchronous computer-mediated communication which helped the students to take control of their own learning and develop their L2 writing more autonomously through social interaction.