The effect of the use of information and communication technology and blogging on the pre-service teacher and student training process.

Blogs are considered to be a useful online tool for learning, teaching, training and education. Students and teachers can share their thoughts and ideas, and can express their feelings and opinions in an online environment (Deng & Yuen, 2011). No special technological skills are needed in order to post a blog entry. Blogging promotes creativity, critical thinking, reflection, collaboration, interaction and active participation. Blogs can help people to gain and share knowledge, as well as to increase the digital literacy of both students and teachers, and to change their attitudes towards information and communication technology (ICT; Goktas & Demirel, 2012). This study investigated the role of blogging in the development of the cognitive, social and self-directed learning skills of students, who were future EFL teachers, during a teaching methodology and teaching practicum course. The participants were 40 university students (third and fourth year). Their ages ranged from 18 to 25 years, their L1 was Cypriot Greek and they all resided in Cyprus. The students were asked to write online blog entries after each of their sessions. The analysis of the data, blog entries and questionnaires, showed that, overall, the students had positive attitudes towards blogging. They believed that blogs facilitated their development as teachers and practitioners via creating an online community in a user-friendly way. The students had the opportunity to interact more with their peers and the tutor, express their views, exchange ideas, gain new knowledge and experience, and increase the level of their digital competence, particularly considering the current COVID situation (Halic et al., 2010). [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]