Using Blogs and Twitter in an EFL classrooms

 "Feedback, Collaboration, Community"

  In this post I will try to outline a sample EFL project that makes use of blogs and twitter as learning tools. My hypothetical situation is a group of teenage EFL learners who attend a course that develops learner's creative writing. Learners would be asked to read Margaret Mitchell's novel "Gone with the Wind" and write a sequel to it afterward . Each group of 3/4 students would write its own ending to Mitchell's unfinished novel and would post the sequals in a blog created specifically for this project. Learners of the group would have to read the sequals of other groups  and leave feedback be either adding comments in blogs or making updates in twitter. Each students would have to post at least one comment for each sequal. The sequals will be both peer-assessed in the form of peer comments and tutor assessed. The latter will mainly be in the form of comments on the content but will also include some feedback on the accuracy and the organization of the narrative. 

  The main challenge might be to overcome the learners' fear of writing creatively in a foreign language. Activities of pre-writing stage, such as introduction and practice of free writing, narrative, descriptive writing, may help to lessen the anxiety related to writing in English.

  This project would be aimed at fostering collaboration among the students and would help them to have a first hand, authentic practice in creative writing. The technology used would help to realize the project in a cost and time efficient manner.