ASSIGNMENT 3

MY BLOGGING EXPERIENCE

This was the first time I actually wrote blogs in my life. I was required to write these blogs as assignments for Organisational Behaviour.

Before this, I always though blogging was a waste of time and was kind of boring. This is because I though that why should people actually write down their lives stories on the internet when they could be doing other better things. I find it a waste of time because there is no guarantee that other people will read your blog especially when they don’t even know you. I mean, why we should read another person’s stories when we don’t even know that person is. I also though that is was boring to write blogs and to read it. I also didn’t blog because almost all my family members and friends don’t do it either. I was not influenced into blogging and was not inspired by anyone to blog.

But after I started writing blogs for my assignment purposes, my perceptions of blogging changed. As a form of assignment, I really like the idea of blogging. This is because blogging is much more intense that just preparing a theoretical assignment. When students do their assignments, they usually just include the theories they studied into their assignments and pass it up. Or even worst, students always intent to “copy and paste” materials, theories, examples, explanations and so on from other articles on the internet. They never really understand what actually they are writing or talking about in their assignments. This causes failure to them to relate what they have studies to the reality world, further they will find difficulties in adapting to working situations in future.

Therefore, I agree with having blogs for assignments because when we write blogs, we don’t just include theories, but we also include a reflective side of a particular topic given to our lives. This reflective portion helps us to understand the topic and subject better and further to relate and apply it in our daily lives. By having assignments in form of blogging, lecturers can also easily identify who understands the topic deeply and who doesn’t by the way the students express themselves and the examples given by them in the blogs that they have experienced in they lives. Blogging can also reduce or totally eliminate the “copy and paste” method commonly used by students in universities. This is because by blogging, students are required to express their own perceptions, ideas, explanation, understandings and experiences. They won’t be able to obtain any of this from the internet and therefore, it increases the credibility in an assignment.

I also think that having assignments in the form of blogs are much more convenient as we don’t have to print the hardcopy and pass up. We just need to create an entry base on the topic given any type the answer and finally just upload it. Indirectly, it also helps to minimize the usage of paper and protect the environment, where global warming seems to be getting worst. This brings me to my first OB theory, which is motivation. Since blogging is much more convenient compared to the normal standard assignments, it really motivated me to complete this assignment. Each blog didn’t take too much time as I was motivated to sit and complete it as soon as possible. I’m also motivated to continue blogging in future, as I really learned a lot from it by sharing ideas and knowledge with other people.


(This video shows the motivation spirit)

The second OB theory I would like to highlight here is individualism. Since I’m a person who prefers completing assignments individually, I really liked the idea of blogging as a form of assignments. This is because completing a task individually is faster and less time consuming. We don’t need to have meeting every week for updates. Also, by having these individual blogging as assignments, students will also be able to share their knowledge and experiences with each other and further, understand more on the topic.

As for me, it was a challenge to write a blog for the first time. This is because I didn’t know how I should write one, how would I address myself and the readers and so on. It was also a challenge because I was requested by the lecturer to even include a reflective portion of my life experience into the blog.

I overcame the challenge by asking my classmates who had wrote blogs before. They actually helped a lot rights from the start, even when I was registering for my blog page. My classmates were very helpful and I felt very thankful to them. Even after we finished our first blog, I didn’t upload the multimedia videos into the blog because I didn’t know how to upload it. My classmates helped me and in my second blog, I was able to upload the videos to make my blog much more interesting. I have not only learned how to upload videos, but also how do I express myself in the blogs.

The reflection portion was a little difficult at first; because I was not sure myself how do I really relate the topic to my experience in live and put it into words on the blog. At first I wan not sure how to actually write the reflection portion, but then I discussed it with my fellow classmates and we kind of figured it out. The first blog was a little difficult as we all have never written such a thing before. But after reading each others blogs, it was easier for us to write the second blog’s reflection portion. This is because we had the idea of how to relate our experience with the topic and the subject matters.

From this blogging assignment, I was able to share lots of knowledge with my peers, who are my classmates. This brings me to my third OB theory, which is knowledge sharing. Firstly when we were required to writes blogs, we weren’t sure of how to do so and we discuss among each other and share each other’s knowledge regarding on how to write an academic blog. Then after the completion of the first blog, we were required to comment on each other’s blogs. Knowledge sharing also took placed when we read each other’s blogs. For example, I wasn’t sure what social learning theory means, and after reading one of my peer’s blog,Miss Naemah, I had a better understanding on it. We also shared knowledge while writing comments for each other, as we learn on how to improve our blogs for the better from the feedbacks by our peers. We also learned from our peers experiences in life as part of knowledge sharing.

After the completion of the first blog, we could feel that our relationship among peers actually improved. This is because of the knowledge sharing culture that emerged between us as we share ideas and experiences in our blogs. After reading each others blogs, we intent to discuss it whenever we happen to meet each other. For example, from the first blog, I wrote about how my mother being so achievement oriented, and Miss Deana, one of my peers, also stated that her mother is also the same. So when we meet, we intent to talk about how our similar our lives are and how we deal with it. We share experiences and therefore, our relationship improved.

This comes to my last OB theory, which is communication. Since by this blogging assignments, all of us have over come the communication barriers among us and share ideas openly. There used to be communication barriers as we don’t really understand what a person is trying to say, or maybe at times we interpret other people wrongly. For example, I had a little problem understanding one of my peers, Mr. Fam. Maybe the way he explain things isn’t too clear for me to interpret it right. But after completing this blogging assignment, he actually improved on the way he expresses himself. I like the way he expresses himself in his blogs especially in the reflective portion. I’m able to understand what he actually means and relate it to the topic given. Therefore, this blogging assignment has helped some of us to overcome our communication barriers especially in expressing ourselves, ideas and perceptions.


(This video shows examples that occur from communication barriers)

In conclusion, I would like to say that I enjoyed blogging this semester, and I hope we will be exposed to more blogging assignments in the future. Good luck to all!!!!


REFERENCES:

1. http://www.wikipedia.com

2. The Knowledge Management Toolkit, Amrit Tiwana, Prentice Hall (2000).

3. McShane & von Glinow2007, from Organizational Behaviour, McGRAW. HILL INTERNATIONAL EDITION

4. http://www.youtube.com