Blog : Help Engineers Practice English

In 21st century education system, Information Technology is playing a vital role. IT has simplified the teaching-learning process in the higher education. Today, Educators worldwide are employing IT as one of the tools for the knowledge transmission. My paper "Blog: Help Engineers Practice English" talks about blogging in the process of teaching. In last five years, Blogs have influenced western education system up to a great extent. A blog (short for weblog) is a frequently updated website that often resembles an online journal. It's easy to create and update a blog - it requires only basic access to the Internet, and a minimum of technical know-how. Because of this, it is one of the easiest ways to publish student writing on the WWW. It's almost as easy as sending an email. Teachers are using blogs to - - provide extra reading practice for students - create online student learner journals that can be read by their peers - guide students to online resources appropriate for their level - increase the sense of community in a class - encourage shy students to participate - stimulate out-of-class discussion - encourage a process-writing approach - help build a closer relationship between students in large classes. In addition to this, there are many reasons why technical teachers may choose to use weblogs with students. One of the best reasons is to provide a real audience for student writing. Usually, the teacher is the only person who reads student writing, and the focus of this reading is usually on form, not content. With weblogs, students can find themselves writing for a real audience that, apart from the teacher, may include their peers, students from other classes, or even other countries, their parents, and potentially anyone with access to the Internet. In this paper I have tried to explore the following issues: - Enabling learners to share their insights (with the help of technology) - Encouraging a healthy learners-teacher-learners communication - Encouraging shy learners participate in online classroom discussions - Helping learners utilize online resources - Helping learners stay informed. I have cited some examples based on the above mentioned issues. I have shared my teaching-blogging experience in the paper and also the results I have achieved with this approach