E-tivity 4 : Feedback

Dear all,

As was the case last week, I really enjoyed reading your blogs. It's nice seeing them take shape and take on your personality a little at a time as you discover their potential. I was also impressed by the debates: you came up with some good arguments on your blogs and then with your peers!

Your fear of technology ("I have to admit that..." "I have to be honest that...") and hating me for at least a short period of time each week ("I didn't understand what the aims were...") are shared among must of you and pretty much fit in with the way your peers felt last year. I know it can be frustrating, but I do it beause I think in the end they will be things you will appreciate. Also know that this semester is technology-intensive whereas the second semester is not since you will have learned all you need to know to function in Web 2.0!

As far as contents are concerned, most of you are making interesting reflections on the topics and do in fact have something to say. Others are still being a bit superficial. This is not directly related to length, but rather how thoroughly you have thought out what you want to say. Take a minute to consider whether your posts have been the thoughtful and insightful ones or a bit more superficial. Remember, you are graded not on language in the blog, but on content quality.

One quick comment: I noticed sometimes you don't always respond to questions your peers ask you in their comments to your blogs. Now we use RSS feeds to keep us updated on what our peers write on their blogs without having to go to them, and to be updated on the comments that come to your blog without having to go to your blog, you can have blogger send you the comments to your email. For example, I receive all comments to the blog in my mailbox to be sure I answer everyone's queries. You can do this by going to your blog --> clicking on Impostazioni --> then Commenti --> and at the bottom of the page there is a box where you can put your email for the comments to be sent to you. It's that easy and, again, should save you time and make you a better blogger! (Also remember, when appropriate, to provide your peers with constructive criticism on language and/or content.)

For the linguistic feedback this week, I've taken a slightly different approach. I've taken the messages and comments from one group and highlighted the mistakes rather than correct them. I would ask you to download and print this file and try and identify what the mistake is and suggest a correction. Then bring your corrections to class on Monday and we'll look at them together. Imagine you're teachers ;-)

One last thing: I notice many of you use various (incorrect) forms of "use to" or "used to" to indicate a habit. In English, you may remember, habits and things we do regularly are expressed with the present and past SIMPLE. This is the case because, whereas in Italian you use the presente for the present (vivo qui), past (vivo qui da anni) and future (domani vado), in English we don't.

Job well done,

Sarah

E-tivity 2 : Language Feedback

Dear all,

I read all of your blog posts, and most of your comments, and can say, without a doubt, that the communicative act in all of them is effective and appropriate. Nonetheless, they're not perfect. Some of your mistakes seem to be due to lack of proof-reading (like spelling mistakes) where others seem to be due to lack of knowledge (like using the present perfect incorrectly). None of them get in the way of understanding, but we're here to improve our English, aren't we?
Each week I will try and take two groups' work correct it and send it to you all as .pdfs linked to a post. I would like to ask you all to print them and carefully analyze the mistakes. I noticed that you often make the same ones and could have a lot to learn from my corrections of other people's mistakes. Please bring them to class on Monday so we can discuss what the common errors are. If you want, try and start making a list of common errors for Monday. In my corrections, I tried not to influence your style, but there are some basic rules that need to be followed if you want your posts to be readable.
I noticed that one or two of you, in your comments, pointed out language mistakes to your peers. Please do that as much as possible as I'm sure you have a lot to learn from each other and could really help each other out.
I've got a question for you: when you come across new words, what do you do with them? Do you just read and forget, or do you write them down somewhere? In other words, what can you do to use the language you find in blogs to help improve your English?
One last thing: as you might have guessed, there's no reading for Monday. I've got another activity planned and that will leave you time and energy to do e-tivity 3 and you deserve a break after your hours spent on the blogosphere!

Sarah

Group A posts and comments
Group B posts and comments

E-tivity 2 : Feedback

Hello there all,

You think exploring the blogosphere is hard work, you should try reading all of your posts and clicking on all of your blogs! Just joking :-) I really enjoyed hearing about all of your experiences and clicking around to see what you’d found. In addition to the aim stated in the e-tivity, the aims were also to help you understand how vast it is so that you’ll appreciate the tools we’re going to use to filter information on the Web and to help you get to know each other a little better. For example, many of you found blogs on travelling, while others focused on more social-political issues, and others yet on hobbies and things you simply just like.

Just a few observations. I noticed that two students received comments from blogs they had linked to. How did that feel? Then I wondered: did any of you leave comments on the blogs you visited? If not, why not? I found a few I left comments on J Then I noticed many of the blogs you found were written by non-native speakers of English in English. Why do you suppose these people choose to write in English if it’s not their native language? Finally, Martina also talks about the authority of the blogger and how you judge the quality of the blog. What criteria did you use to judge the authority of the blogs you visited? I noticed that some of you found blogs where the most recent post was a long time ago. One criteria you should always use is how often posts are published and how long ago the last one was.

I’m going to use your words to comment on your impressions of the blogosphere and the genre of blogs. I’ll be sending another message where I focus more on the language, by looking at the posts written by groups A and B.

Impressions of the blogosphere

You got tired…

So, surfing the blogosphere is pretty exhausting...(Enrico)

You got lost…

I lost myself on the net looking for blogs which could catch my attention and two or three hours later I found them. (Davide)

Perhaps, lost in technorati like me?! But, in the end, after hours and hours spent searching for blogs, I decided to suggest you these three wonderful blogs! (Elena V.)

..uf, I just got back from very long trip around the blogosphere. I have to say that I do feel overwhelmed with information right now. There is just so much out there to explore, read and learn about. (Nina)

You had fun…

I have never been very interesting in navigating blogs, but I enjoyed doing it! There are many things you can learn! (Claudia)

My trip around the blogosphere has been very interesting. (Marina F.)

is a so fashinating world....there are any sort of blogs that you can visit and so many interesting things to read and see. (Imma)

You felt frustrated…

I have to admit it was pretty tough and took me quite a lot of time to find out which blogs to choose for this week e-tivity, as there where so many I actually find myself 'drunk' of blogs. :-D (Anna, Group I)

I spent a lot of time searching for interesting blogs on the topics that I chose but I don’t believe I succeeded. (Elena B)

Bloggosphere is something I'm experiencing for the first time and I'm a bit disoriented. (Eva)

You did it!

At the beginning I had difficulties in finding the blogs, but then I tried to focus on my interests and I managed to find two blogs. (Giovanna Sim)

After having spent hours and hours on the blogosphere, I've finally found something interesting! It has been a hard work because there are so many blogs!!! (Sara B.)

Language

Some thought it was informal

I would say that the authors mostly use simple language with many colloquialisms and slang words in order to make their blogs more informal as possible, so that the readers can easily interact with them. (Valentina)

It looks as if the persons who wrote posts were directly addressing to somebody they know well. (Elisa S.)

the language must be clear, simple, colloquial and informal, as it is in a usual conversation.

(Alessandrasq)

Others thought it depended on the context

The language depends on the writer and his purposes: it may be quite formal for professional comments and technical details or informal if the writers decides to put more of themselves in their posts. (Federico)

the language can vary from specialized to everyday according to the topic and the audiance. It can be also spontaneous, just like a real conversation, or a little bit more planned when it describes something. Of course, the formality of the language used might be influenced by the relationship between bloggers and readers. (Selena)

I noticed that informal blogs containing personal experiences (I would call them ‘diary-blogs’) tend to be shorter and simpler than those dealing with more delicate and complicated issues of general interest (religion, education, linguistics, war...) , even if slang is sometimes not so easy to understand. (Elisa C.)

Others noticed a difference between posts and comments

Both blogs have an informal style, which can be seen in the use of abbreviations, smileys, colloquial expressions (like for example "by the way"..) and in the omission of the grammatical subject (like in the sentence "Can't wait to try this out.."). In particular, an informal style characterizes the comments visitors leave on the blog. (Marta, Group B)

Then I noticed that, usually, posts are longer and more formal than the comments people leave, which contain much more colloquial expression ( Oh my gosh., Cool!, Wicked!). (Sara DT)

Style

the name of the blog has to attract the reader’s attention, and the layout needs to be appealing but not too sophisticated. (Federico)

The impression I got was that writers were more interested in conveying the message in the most effective way, than respecting grammar and style-formality. (Anna, Group I)

There’s one thing I’ve noticed in almost all the blogs I visited: the clearness of the layout and the simplicity og the design. (Elena B.)

Importance of linking

The idea of sharing all that we know and post it in our blog is supported by the use of links. Every blog has its part reserved to links, that are a series of blogs connected to yours that deal with the same topic. This allows you to surf and immerge you totally in the topic you want, to meet people with your own interests and above all to learn and compare what you already know! (Giovanna Sperotto)

generally the structure of blogs consists of quite little pieces of information, well divided and normally characterised by links or words in bold. (Anna, Group I)

Job well done :-)

Sarah

E-tivity 1 : Feedback

Hello there everyone,

I thoroughly enjoyed looking at all your pictures, reading your posts and clicking on your links. You all did an excellent job letting us know about yourselves through your pictures, explanations and styles of writing. Speaking of style, I noticed some of you were very concise while others wrote longer posts. I also noticed that some of you used a natural but formal style, while others used an almost text-like style of blogging. I hope we'll be able to discuss some of these issues in class. I'd be curious to find out why and to see what your different impressions are.

Just a few comments on 'responding'. When you write a comment on a blog post, you are entering into a sort of conversation with not only the person who wrote the post, but the other bloggers too. This means two things:
1 - If your comment isn't the first one, read the others two, and if appropriate make reference to what they say in your comment as well. Just as you might in an oral conversation.
2 - Always go back and read your peers' comments to your posts. They may often ask you questions or want further explanations/information and if you don't respond, you've left them hanging.
In other words, you need to follow the basic rules of oral conversation in an online text format.

One last thing: some of you figured out the tags, or labels or etichette funciton. Very Web 2.0 of you! The point of these words is to identify your message in some way and, consequently, make it more easily retrievable. You can insert these below your post in the little block that says "opzioni post" or "post options". I noticed some of you put the group name or your own name (or both). It appears you can only put one (please do correct me if I'm wrong). Very interesting :-)

Job well done.

Sarah