Language blogging community: Fostering the learning attitudes and writing skills of EFL students

This paper empirically studies a group of first-year EFL college students in a blog-supported composition class in Taiwan. To improve their writing skills, the participants kept journal blogs within a language blogging community (LBC) where users could receive free help (e.g., corrections/comments) from native speakers regarding entries written in a second/foreign language (in this case, English). Students’ writing skills and learning attitudes (anxiety about writing) were assessed (by multifaceted examination) before and after the classes. The results show that over the sessions the participants formed active blogging patterns and expressed themselves better, using more linguistic information. These encouraging signs echoed the students’ improved compositional skills and reduced writing anxiety. The pedagogical suitability of blogging in EFL writing classes is discussed and topics are suggested for future studies.補正完