The Effects of Blogging on EFL Writing Achievement

Abstract

Few studies were conducted on the effects of blogging specifically on English as a foreign language (EFL) writing achievement. Moreover, those studies did not address the effect of blogs on writing achievement in the Turkish EFL context. Thus, this study aims to investigate the effects of the use of blogs on EFL writing achievement among Turkish EFL learners. In this experimental study, a background questionnaire, a writing achievement pre-test and a post-test were administered to a sample group of 40 EFL learners. The data gathered were used to provide a statistical analysis to address the research question. Results indicate that blogging itself does not provide a better performance in terms of writing achievement, while the process-based writing instruction positively affects their achievement in both traditional and blog environments. It is recommended that teachers should be aware that the use of blogs does not guarantee better writing achievement among Turkish EFL learners andshould create a writing environment in which they encourage students to write in the target language to increase their writing achievement.