Student Generated Content in higher education technology-related blogs

This interdisciplinary study integrates technology, linguistics and language teaching theories and methods and highlights the effectiveness of technology-related blogs, created and maintained by students. For the purpose of this paper, various aspects of the Student Generated Content (SGC) postings quality as well as certain technical writing skills (e.g. relevance and exemplification) are examined. SGC has been analyzed using discourse analysis as a methodological tool. Student informal conversational interviews have also been used as supportive evidence. The results of the study indicate that while the students possess certain technical writing skills (e.g. relevance), they lack exemplification-an essential skill in technical written communication. The study highlights the dual pedagogical significance of student technology-related blog development both a) as a highly motivating student learning activity and b) as a valuable source of data collection (SGC Discourse) useful for educators and researchers to assess students´ written language expression.