TASK 2 - ARTICLE REVIEW

Article Review - Collaborative Learning Skills Used in Weblog

this is the website : http://callej.org/journal/11-2/kanniah_krish.html

Section A

The article that I have chosen for this assignment is from a website CALL-EJ online. This article is actually a research on collaborative learning skills used in weblog. This research is taken from the Computer assisted Language Learning Journal, Volume 11, number 2. The article was written by Anuratha Kanniah and Pramela Krish. Pramkela Krish is a lecturer in Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia. She is a lecturer with the school of language studies and linguistics in the Faculty of Social Sciences and Humanities at the university. Over the years, she has done many researched in online learning and her worked has been published international journals all over the world. She is very interested in doing research regarding computer enhanced language learning. Anuratha Kanniah on the hand is a lecturer from University College of Innovation and Technology Malaysia. She is teaching English as foreign language to the international students at the college. She also conducts training for teachers and professionals from the corporate world. She is very much interest in doing research in the area of e-learning.

Section B – Summary

The aims of the research

Since that both of the researchers have interests in E- learning, the research is obviously on that. As the title of this article suggests, this research is Computer Supported Collaborative Learning (CSCL). The aim of this research is to discover the learner’s collaborative learning skills and sub-skills that improve the interaction in the context of CSCL. The researchers studied the attributes that been used in both skills and sub-skills to have more detailed information about the underlying processes that take place in the interaction. To achieve this aim, the researchers have come up with two research questions for this research which are:-

1. What are the skills and sub-skills used among the participants in the weblog?
2. To what extent the internal and external processes predispose a collaborative discussion in a weblog?

The methodology of the research

Due to the nature of this study, the qualitative research is much more suitable for this research as it can investigate a deeply for finding out the results. That is why the researchers used qualitative theory techniques, in which the designed were to explore how a topic was being discussed where the researchers construct the findings based on the ideas of the participants through interviews. For this research, the researchers used the constructivist and socio-cultural perspectives posted by a group of postgraduates in the weblogs to analysed the aspect of collaborative learning. This is parallel with the purpose of the where the researchers to find out the preferred collaborative skills and sub-skills that the students used in the context of computer-based learning. Due to the nature of this study, the qualitative research is much more suitable for this research as it can investigate a deeply for finding out the results.

The subject/sample

A literary text was given to 11 postgraduates that have been chosen to be the sample of this study. One of the similar characteristic that these 11 samples have is that they all possess a basic degree.

The Findings of the research

For the research question no 1, the findings is that 59.82% of the overall interaction is based on Active Learning skills. The next one is conversation with the percentage of 21.68% while creative conflict skills only used around 18.5% percentage from the overall interaction. The researchers has also identified the sub-skills for each skills that been used. The sub-skills that been used, for Active learning are inform, request and motivate. The sub-skills for conversation are acknowledgement, task and maintenance while sub-skills for creative conflicts are argue and mediate. For research question no 2, based on the results shown, the researchers has summarize that the samples are cognitively and socially inclined thus makes learning the presence of both social and cognitive factors involves in learning.

Section C – My reaction

Does the research interest you?

Generally this research interests me. At the first glance of the title – collaborative learning skills used in weblog-, I quickly looked into it because to be honest, before this, I never thought that collaborative learning skills are used when we are using weblog. So the title itself has made me interested in looking deeper into it. Another reason why this research interests me is because my knowledge about CALL is very little. I believe, in taking deeper look and reading about this article, I will learn more knowledge and perhaps can apply it for my own benefits later in the future. One more reason why this research interests me is because I am a weblog user too. I use weblog everyday and I also surf internet everyday too. This is why I want to take a closer look at this research because I probably can relate to what I have been doing every day.

Do you think the research well conducted?

I think this research is well conducted. However, I do believe that perhaps few steps can be taken in making this a much better research. One of the few steps that I would suggest is that the number of samples is to be increased. For example to 30 or 40 students so that the results can be more reliable if the number of students is a lot more than eleven. I would also suggest that the population of the samples can be among the undergraduates’ students, rather than just postgraduates students. I believe if there is more variety in conducting this research, it will be more interesting regarding the result of the research.

What is/are the implication(s) of the research in the teaching and learning of ESL ( in the general and Malaysian contexts)

I believe, through this research, it can give great effects towards teaching and learning of ESL. Generally, it will add another method of teaching English throughout the world. As people keep saying, the world is getting smaller and smaller, thus the importance of English as the international language becomes more important. That is why, having using this weblog method in addition to the already-a lot method of teaching English, it can help the learners to learn the language better., With the rapid growth of globalization, this method is also going to be useful as it is updated with the current trend nowadays, and it is going to indirectly to attract interest of people to learn English more. For the Malaysian context, with the introduction of using weblog and learning English at the same time, this will have great impact on our people to advance their knowledge in English, but also with the technology so that we can always keep up with other well-developed country. It also can increase the use of IT among the Malaysians citizens. It may seems a small step, but this small step can lead to a much bigger step in the future.