Impact of using blogs on summary writing skills of EFL university students

Abstract

This study examines the impact of using blogs on developing students’ summary writing skills and the perceptions of Saudi undergraduate EFL students on using blogs in developing their summary writing skills. The study participants comprised 20 female students, and the data were drawn from pre/post-tests and a questionnaire. The results revealed that blogs are an effective tool that positively impacts learners’ summary writing skills. Moreover, most participants showed positive attitudes towards using blogs in EFL writing; they perceived blogging as a helpful tool that increases motivation and interest to learn, fosters autonomous learning and critical thinking, improves collaboration skills, and provides powerful feedback. Furthermore, the participants reported many benefits of this blogging project: improving learners’ English language skills, facilitating collaboration among students, saving time, developing summary writing skills, and ease of use. However, some participants mentioned drawbacks such as the difficulty of using blogs and the lack of peer comments. Further, some found blogging to be time-consuming. Overall, the benefits of blogging outperformed the drawbacks, demonstrating that blogs are a beneficial and effective tool for EFL learning and teaching; they can improve student writing skills in general and summary writing skills in particular.