Thesis : Literature Review

Got a task for my Writing IV to write the literature review in thesis. It is quite difficult since we have to synchronize our research's title and the content of literature review ( outlines or keywords, previous studies, definition, etc ). It is also need some skills, such as skills in quotation and defining. So here is my work and I
think it is far from good, but at least I have tried my best... ^_^

Title : Improving Students’ Summary Writing Skill Using A Class Blog at English Study Program, UHO.

BAB II

                                                        LITERATURE REVIEW      

The using of blog in language learning is actually quite famous which also supported by some claims that blog gives benefits for both teacher and students and it is somehow one of the good way in improving students’ writing skills.

1.1  BLOG

Blog is a place ( web page ) where people can write freely about something. It could be about their life, or as a place to share creativity they produced ( poem, short story, article, and etc ) in written form. According to Boas in Orachorn KITCHAKARN ( 2012 ), “ The term blog is a blend of two words: web and log; it is a web page with regular diary or journal entries that incorporates different postings by authors and responses to these posts by an audience “, so every posts that people do in the blog can be seen by anyone in this world since it is a web page.

In fact, nowadays blog is a familiar thing for teenagers. They create their own blog and post everything on it.  “ According to EDUCAUSE, a nonprofit association that promotes information technology, as many as 50 million people currently use blogs and blogs are gaining acceptance as instructional tools “, (Sharita Forrest, 2006 ).

Since internet becomes famous for teenagers, blog as a part of internet might be a good way to engage students’ interest and motivation, especially for those whom shy and less confidence. The using of blog in educational world has function as a media for sharing information between teacher and students related to the course. Blog could be a the best way to involve both teacher and students in a real time discussion and enable them to do more communication outside the classroom.

For type of activities, teacher can creatively exploit the blog including its features to create such an interesting way of learning. It could be teacher made a class blog or allow them to create their own blog. Teacher can ask students to do peer editing or feedback where have to post something ( based on the course task ) and also comment on their friends’ posts. Some people have tried this way and it is all show the good result.

1.2  THE USING OF BLOG IN LANGUAGE LEARNING

The interest of using blog for educational purpose is increasing nowadays affected by the digital era, especially in learning English language learning. Noytim in Orachorn KITCHAKARN ( 2012 ) stated “ Weblogs have been asserted to have powerful means for developing English language teaching and learning for many reasons. Weblogs offer authentic learning environment through real communication. In writing, the audiences are not only teachers but also peers including other people outside the classroom, a global audience “.

Like what the researcher has stated before, type of activities where students can do peer editing makes them motivate to write. They can freely sharing ideas and discuss about the difference in their post. It is  supported by  Ferdig & Trammell in Orachorn KITCHAKARN ( 2012 ) which stated that “ Blogs are very effective tools in teaching and learning since they provide students with an environment that helps students reflect and publish their own thoughts in form of writing “.

The other benefits of blog in language learning is that encouraging students’ independence in learning. Sometimes, a period class time does not enough to do the lesson plan, so teacher will ask students to read or write outside the classroom. If you ask them to do it traditionally ( reading book or journal and write in a paper ), students will be easily bored but if ask them to do it on the internet ( read online journal or article, or anything they can find or related to internet ), it will be more interesting for them.

According to Bloch in Orachorn KITCHAKARN ( 2012 ) “ Using blogs for teaching writing skills is very useful because of many reasons:

Ø  blogs are easy to create and maintain;

Ø  they encourage students to be more prolific writers;

Ø  they make writing easier to share;

Ø  they support group work, feedback, and collaboration;

Ø  they provide opportunities to write outside of class;

Ø  they can access or link to multimedia and related texts; they offer students with sense of authorship; and

Ø  they encourage teachers to use blogs in various ways of teaching. “

1.3  STUDENTS’ SUMMARY WRITING SKILLS

As an ESL or EFL students, writing is one of the skills that they have to mastering. According to Tom Bello in 1997, writing itself is a process in finding a best way ( language  ) to communicate someone’s feeling or thought to others. “ Writing also enhances language acquisition as learners experiment with words, sentences, and larger chunks of writing to communicate their ideas effectively and to reinforce the grammar and vocabulary they are learning in class, “ ( Bello, 1997 ).

One of the skills in writing is summarizing. Summarizing is re-statement briefly a text we have read by our own words. There are two keywords about summary, they are 1.) It is shorter than the original one, 2.) written in the words of the person who summarizing ( in different phrases and sentences ). The general rules of summarization include (a) deletion of unnecessary  information, (b) substitution of a superordinate term for a list of items or  actions, and (c) selection of a topic sentence (Brown & Day in J. Ron Nelson & Deborah J. Smith, 1992 ).

Writing summary is not that easy since we have to avoid the using of same phrases and sentences of the original text and we have to make in a shortened form. Not only good to improve students’ writing skills,  as they make a draft and do editing, but summarizing is also good to improve their  reading skills, as they try to figure out the main ideas of their reading, and the last it is good for their vocabulary since they have to paraphrase or brain-storming to find the best words and sentences in order to avoiding same phrases and sentences in summarizing. 

Since it is difficult to do, teacher needs to find out the best way in teaching writing summary to students. One thing that teacher can do is teaching students how to paraphrase. Paraphrase is a re-statement of the meaning of a text or passage using other words. Related to summarizing, we do the paraphrase to change the summary significantly from the original. Model changing the grammar and vocabulary of the sentences, and have the student help with this as much as they can. This is a good way to help expand their vocabularies. Teacher can simply ask the students to write down again what they have read but using a different words.

1.4  PREVIOUS STUDY IN THIS AREA OF RESEARCH

Many research were conducted to see how extend the effect of blog in improving students’ writing skill, especially summarizing. Blog and any other discussion forum  ( facebook, email, chat room ) on the internet have been used for language learning, and to see the effect of blog in language learning and students’ summary writing skills, here  is some previous studies  in this area of research.

By Maria B. Cequena ( 2013 ) conducted a study to the forty-one freshman college  students‟ writing performance based on the results obtained from  pre-test (entry essays) and posttest (exit essays) mean scores, interviews and reflections. The result showed that students‟ writing skills improved based on the results of paired samples dependent t-test of their entry and exit essays‟ mean scores at p<0.05 level of significance. Furthermore,  three independent raters unanimously agreed that students improved  on content and organization. These findings matched students‟  perception that blogging helped them improve their writing skills because of their peers‟ constructive feedback.

Another study by Nadzrah Abu Bakar & Kemboja Ismail ( 2010 ) that observed students’ attitude towards writing skills ( write constructively ) through blog projects as part of an integrated English project assignment. The findings show the good results is that the students had a positive attitude about blogging. The students perceived blogging as an interesting and motivating learning environment because interacting through blogs helped with the critical thinking and peer feedback facets of their writing projects. They also found that social interaction helped students improve their writing skills.

The last study related to the effect of blog in improving students’ summary writing skills is showed by Orachorn KITCHAKARN ( 2012 ) observed on 33 first- year students enrolled in a fundamental English course (EN011) in the first semester of 2012 academic year. The research finding indicates that blogs are powerful tools that contribute to the improvement of students’ summary writing abilities. From comparing the result of the pretest and posttest, it revealed that the students’ summary writing abilities significantly improved.