Article Review

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Title: Can Web 2.0 Technology Assist College Students in Learning English Writing? Integrating Facebook and Peer Assessment with Blended Learning

Journal: Australasian Journal of Educational Technology, Volume 27, page 829-845. 2011

Author: Dr Ru-Chu Shih, Assistant Professor, Department of Modern Languages
National Pingtung University of Science and Technology, Taiwan

Summary

The main goal of this research article is to investigate the effect of integration between Facebook and peer assessment towards the college English writing class instruction. This integration is coined as blended teaching approach. The approach consists of one-third of the semester of in-class instruction, and the remaining two thirds of the semester, the classroom instruction is combined with Facebook and peer assessment. In order to obtain the data, a group of 23 first year students from a technological university in Taiwan majoring in English were asked to participate in an 18-week English writing class. The group of students was later divided into three separating groups using the platform of Facebook according to their performance in English writing prior to the program. These groups later were divided into two more groups within each Facebook group to make peer assessment easier. The members were asked to upload their writing assignment every week to be assessed by their peer on the Facebook page. Approaches used in this research are both qualitative and quantitative. Research instruments include pre-test and post-test of English writing skills, a survey questionnaire and in-depth student interview. The findings show that incorporating web 2.0, Facebook in this case, for the purpose of peer assessment is interesting and effective for college level English writing class. It is a step towards autonomous learning where the students do not only learn through classroom interaction but they also incorporate cooperative learning in their conduct by doing peer assessment. Besides, Facebook usage also increases the students’ motivation and interest in the lesson due to the informality of the medium. This research provides the method on how to incorporate the lesson with technology that is the Internet, especially web 2.0.

Review

I found this topic to be interesting to me since I was once involved in a Facebook group learning as well but the result was a contrast from this. In my experience, there was hardly any interaction that happened between the group members and we somehow do not really understand the function of the group. Although the focus of both these Facebook groups is different (mine was more to a discussion group whereas the sample group was more to assessment group), but it shows students’ perception might differ on the term of applying Web 2.0 as part of the lesson. Not everyone is actually keen to the idea of integrating social network websites into education due to various reasons. Some of the reason could be that some students feel like social network is the only place where they can escape from their life as a student and the formal setting of the education scene. This research also interests me by actually providing evidence to how the use of social network can help learning. A lot of speculation has been made whether it is possible or not to use the social networking as part of educational tools in teaching language. This research with its findings provides the evidence needed to prove the point that learning is possible to be done on the net. It also provided us with the factors that may hinder the lesson or instruction. Among them is distractions that are present in internet based learning such as non academic interactions with friends and gaming applications. Next is this research also shows a more cost effective medium of teaching as work are uploaded in Facebook page and less paper are used and the feedback also can be given instantaneously. It is cost effective in terms of financial as well as time.

The research is well conducted in my point of view. The first point is time. The participants or the samples were given ample time to be assessed as the program was an 18 week program and change is possible to happen in this period of time. It was not hasty and the development is well documented as they are written in the Facebook pages that have been created. Hence, the collection of data is made easy. The interaction also uses all the application provided by Facebook and this can help the researcher categorized the interaction that happened in the pages. Besides time and data collection, the involvement from all parties, students and the educator shows how well the research is conducted. The students are not left alone to develop on themselves as the educator constantly monitors and provides feedback to help the learning but the assessment is done by the students to show the level of their understanding.

Impact is one of the main factors in doing research. This research for me is very impactful. It provides us with the view of how education I the future might be. Even nowadays, the integration of technology in classroom in teaching language is rising; this could be the development to bring the lesson outside classroom. This research serves as a guideline on how to conduct a lesson as well as integrating social networking in language instruction. This research is also inherent with the idea of life long learning and learning at all time. Since the medium used for the learning is Internet, it is available on various media such as computers, tablets and smartphones. Lesson could happen anywhere and the handing of assignments also could happen anywhere, given the Internet connectivity. This also brought another level in language learning that is learning in informal setting and learning at your own pace. Plus, by using the internet, if the students were to need help in finding information, they can get information instantaneously by just opening up a new tab and search for the answer on the internet. Therefore, this research for me is impactful for the development of language learning instruction in the future.