Anna Bougia - Rethinking Autonomy | VocTEL 2015

1. Rethinking autonomy through
multiliteracies pedagogy: An
innovative wikis & blogs
project
Anna Bougia, M.A, PhD
(cand), Bolton University

2.  The philosophy behind action research
 Research on writing in wikis and blogs
 The cycles of action: from amfoteronomy to autonomy
 The RAWB innovative research project
 Primary results
 Reflections
Presentation outline

3.  Mills (2011) defines action research design as a systematic
procedure done by teachers address a specific educational
problem, test and improve their own practice and thus
student learning.
 Action research invite participants to describe “how things
happen and how it affects them”
 No pre-determined hypothesis and specific variables
 My goal: to understand and solve a problem in a particular
setting
THE Philosophy behind action
research

4. Why wikis?

5. Students' perceptions of Wiki-based collaborative writing
for learners of English as a foreign language (2010),
National Kaohsiung Normal University, Taiwan
 86% preferred writing on wiki that in a word document
 71.4% they were more aware of their language use
 73.5% considered Wiki helpful to work on ideas and to
plan the organization into outlines
Students’ positive feedback

6.  83.7% considered Wiki-mediated collaborative writing to be
able to enhance peer interaction.
 75.5% their writing ability was enhanced through member
revising records in history on wiki.
 Many participants reported that they learned vocabulary,
spelling, and phrases as well as sentence structure by
reading the work of others on the Wiki pages and learning
from the writing produced by their peers.
Students’ positive feedback

7. High interaction & engagement level

8. Motivation boost-the sense of
belonging

9.  Enhanced writing skills (written grammar and structure)
 Changed students attitude towards writing
 Build confidence in writing
 Students wrote more than what was required –used
sentences more complex and creative than usual.
Benefits in writing skills

10.  Sharing versus self-reflection
 Socialization versus personalization
 Self-evaluation
 To encourage free-writing
 Immediate feedback
Why blogs?

11. My RABWP project

12. Examples of good practice: 1st CYCLE

13. Examples of good practice: 2nd Cycle

14. EXAMPLE OF POOR
COLLABORATION:2nd cycle

15. The RAWB Project: 3rd Cycle
 Wikis for individual writing , cooperation and peer
feedback from one or two self-selected
knowledgeable peers
 Blogs for reflective writing- immediate classroom
feedback

16. The RAWB Project

17. The misconception of feedback-
intervention

18. An example of smooth cooperation

19. A teacher dependent learner

20. A successful example of
amfoteronomy

21.  ReinaldPrespa Nov 14, 2013
 Is very good..but it will be better to not be a copy paste
from internet :)
 ahmed234 Nov 15, 2013
 its not copy paste its about what i understand
 ReinaldPrespa Nov 18, 2013
 its still a copy paste
A Debate on the qualities of
academic writing

22. Self-reflection-course evaluation

23. Instructor evaluation-enthusiasm
about learning

24. Self-evaluation

25. Class material evaluation

26. Students’ perceptions

27. Students’ perceptions

28. In the spectrum of autonomy

29. A community of mutual trust?

30. Feedback Quality

31. Readiness for autonomy

32. Readiness for autonomy

33.  Wikis encouraged engagement level
in the writing and leaning process.
 Wikis: encouraged meaningful peer
interaction but not reflection
 Wikis encouraged amfoteronomy and
sense of responsibility when
feedback was comprehensible
 Advanced level of English does not
guarantee good cooperation skills
 Negative attitude to criticism is a
factor that discourages students to
ask for peer feedback
 Students reported that self selection
of writing topics would further
motivate them to interact in wikis
 Feedback is regarded mainly as
instructor’s responsibility
 Blogs: encouraged students to
express their believes about:
 the class, the syllabus, the
instructor, peer relationship,
 Blogs motivated students: to reflect
on their learning and identify their
strengths and weaknesses
 Blogs helped the instructor to get
immediate feedback about the
learning process.
 Students need more training on how
to write reflective journals
 Most students are not willing to
share their reflections about learning
My reflections

34.  The combination of blogs and wikis in the writing class can
transform teaching and learning experience:
 Students can get benefit from peers’ and teacher’s
feedback
 Students take responsibility for their own learning
 Peer interaction encourages a positive atmosphere in the
class
 Wikis multimodal environment gives opportunities to all
students to be creative
 Free writing in blogs helps low profile students to express
their feelings
My reflections