The Final Blog: My Perceptions On Blogging

I’m a final year student studying here in MMU and this is my final trimester. During my 5 years of studying here, this is actually the first time that the subject requires me to do blogging as a form of assignment (a big applause to the lecturer). There are 3 blogs to write on and each with different topics, given by the lecturer and this, is finally the last one.

First of all, according to Wikipedia, a blog (a contraction of the term "Web log") is a Web site, usually maintained by an individual, with regular entries of commentary, descriptions of events, or other material such as graphics or videos.

I had a blog of my own that tells the ups and downs of my life. I like to express my feelings there and share it with certain people I know. I do it regularly and I felt quite relief after that. I even like to read other peoples blog when I have the free time. I found that very interesting as I might learn something new from them, for example, the best foods and hang outs place in Malaysia, and etc.

So, having to do blog as my assignment is something I really looked into. I found it interesting the moment Mr. Goh, the lecturer announced to us that we have to create a blog as our assignment. Doing blog as an assignment, for me, really helps the student to pinpoint their own point of view on things, especially in the relation part. It makes sure that the students really understand the subject that they learned, at the same time practice what they have learned, apply it in their daily life. But, somehow, to certain students, for example, me, I found it quite hard to relate the theories that I have learned in my daily life. It took me some time to do the relation part. That is why from the 3 topics given for this blog, I find this one, the last blog is the toughest among all! It is because from the first sentence until the last one, it was all about what I have learned and what I have understood through this whole assignments and the subject itself.

I was at first enthusiastic to start the blog, as I am fond of writing blog. But sadly, the topics of the blog are quite hard and require me to do some research on my own to complete them.

In terms of challenges, for me, I don’t think there is much hassle to do the blog. It just takes a couple of minutes if you already have the idea on what to write and babble about. Compared to the usual assignments (report, research method, etc), blogging seems much easier and interesting. It is more relax without having to do a certain format of assignment. However, the challenge comes when I start writing the blog. I don’t have the enthusiasm to write it at first because of the hard topic. And then, it requires me to put videos and links in there. Although I had been blogging for quite some time, I still don’t quite sure on how to put the videos on the blog as I rarely put videos in my blog. Another challenge is to complete the blog in time. The time given in writing the blog is short and at the same time I had too many assignments to go through (as this is my final trimester!). I’m the one who can’t survive without hanging out with friends in a day and that made me can’t catch up with the assignments. I did manage to submit them in time, but the quality is obviously low. This is where I motivate myself with positive reinforcement, where I usually tell to myself that I CAN go out IF one of my assignments was done. For example, this one day, I really want to shop for shoes. I had one assignment to be submitted the next day though, so, I promised to myself that I can buy not only one, but two shoes once I had finished the assignment. Seriously, it did help me in finishing my assignments on time.

There are pros and cons on doing blogging. Through blogging, one of the advantage that I can get is knowledge sharing. Sharing knowledge is the easiest and the most obvious advantage that I can have by blogging. Bloggers tend to share knowledge with each other without them knowing it. For example, from the topics given by Mr. Goh, the seven of us tend to write our own ideas and thoughts on it. We all learned by the differences in our thoughts unconsciously. We were able to share our information in a nick of time and as easy as it can be (we just read each other’s blogs). And, from these kinds of activities; I can say that our relationship was improved, as we got to know each other well by reading the blogs and sharing information. The other advantage that I can say is that it saves a lot of time. It requires you to just sit there, find information on the internet, and start writing. Also, this blogging activity is an IT- wise, which is good for us to maintain technology wise, as this is one of the trend in nowadays globalization world – you can chare information through the whole wide world. I also think that blogging creates this sense of social awareness, where people can understand and be sensitive to the other people’s feelings, thoughts, and situations.

For me, there are only two cons of blogging, which one of them is in terms of lack of privacy. Yes, we want to share our thoughts and feelings with others through blogging, but at some times, the involvement of someone you did not know in your life makes it a little bit awkward. The other cons is it is too dependable on technology, so, if let’s say one day the system was down, it is hard for us to do the blog and submit it to the lecturer.

Through doing this blog, I can relate to one of the theory in the subject called the Johari Window theory, where we get to know and understand ourselves better so that other people see us better. First, we tend to share with others a bit about ourselves in the blog, and get feedback form others, as the blog requires us to give feedbacks and comments to others. At the same time, we interact with others through knowledge and information sharing. This is obviously good for the learning environment, and once again, the relationship among us is improved.

For me, this whole blogging as a form of assignment is really good for both the students and the lecturers. It really saves time, and makes knowledge sharing easier. I think this kind of activities should be more practiced in the university by the lecturers. This came to my last word; I enjoyed doing this blog, I enjoyed the subject very much (as I like to learned on how to understand people better and at the same time develop myself to be more discipline and positive) although there are a lot to read, and I enjoyed having Mr. Goh as the lecturer as he always have many stories and things to tell (even there is no enough time). I also enjoyed the companies from all of you and I really hope to see you in the future. Good luck and thank you! :)