Students’ Views toward the Usage of Weblogs for Educational Purposes in Nigerian Tertiary Institutions

The aim of this paper was to evaluate students’ views toward the usage of weblogs for educational purposes in Ondo state tertiary institutions. Three research questions were designed to guide the study. The population consisted of all undergraduates in three selected tertiary institutions in Ondo state. The sample of the study consisted of 358 respondents who were selected using convenience and purposive sampling techniques. A self-structured questionnaire was used to collect data. The result of the findings revealed that students are aware of the usage of weblogs for educational purposes. The findings revealed that students show a positive perception toward the weblog. It was also revealed that Blogs help to provide solutions to Group assignments through enhanced interaction, promote reflective learning, and enhance interaction between teachers and students. Lastly, the results of the study revealed that constraints such as inadequate electricity, bad internet facility, lack of mobile phones and personal computers, lack of relevant software, and insufficient knowledge are the constraints toward the usage of weblogs. Based on the findings of this study, it was recommended among other things that administrators of tertiary institutions should create an enabling environment for intellectual exchange, aligning with tertiary institutions' curriculum to promote the use of weblogs for educational purposes. It was also recommended that Governments should install robust and reliable Internet (Wi-Fi) facilities through the Department of ICT Directorate in the tertiary institutions.


INTRODUCTION
The present world is facing modifications in diverse aspect of life, and the most modern era of the twentieth century and the beginning of the twenty-first century have witnessed massive developments, mainly in the area of ICT. The education sector is exceptional among other sectors affected by this development. The mode of instruction for all educational levels was a traditional classroom before the adoption of ICT into teaching and learning (Singh, 2013). The 21st-century technologies in the system of education have brought about change in the mode of learning. The progress recorded in ICT has given birth to a modern educational delivery system such as blogging.
Covington (2012) indicated that modern-day views on education indicated that learning is achieved in different of ways. Learning occurs when information is processed, either inside or outside teaching space settings. Covington (2012) stated that the lecture hall, whether traditional or virtual, offers the organized public base within which students must to build environments and construct meaning from the course narrative. Learning is perceived as an unlimited process in which diverse learning tools and approaches are adopted. In the present-day, there are ICT tools that can provide easier and faster access to learning and sharing knowledge and ideas. One of these is by using weblog which allows students to express their views freely. Nepomuceno (2011) remarked that blogs provide access to learners to express their writing ideas and share their writing skills online. Ellison & Wu (2008) stated that weblogs facilitates reflective thinking and assist handlers to understand the way their intelligent has improved gradually.
Armstrong & Retterer (2008) viewed blog as a web page that encompasses of multimedia, commentaries, and hyperlinks. The process of blogging involves publishing selected educational materials such as school news, lecture notes as well as other class activities on the internet for benefit of students. Universities can create a blog where students can visit for current information from the school, while the lecturers also can create pages and blogs to engage students in interactive academics purposes. Omotunde (2014) submitted that the utilization of weblogs affect academic performance of students n Nigeria. Investigation of opinions of students toward the utilization of weblogs for the purposes of education in Nigerian tertiary institutions would assist students in effective learning and adoption of ICT learning environments.
There is a crucial need therefore, to conduct a thorough investigation in this context for a better understanding and implement weblog usage for educational purposes in Nigerian tertiary institutions. In light of this, the current study is intend to evaluate students' views toward the usage of weblogs for educational purposes and contribute to the body of knowledge on ICT. The researcher is of the opinion that this research will provide noteworthy information to promote the successful and effective implementation of ICT in Nigerian tertiary institutions.

LITERATURE REVIEW
Halic, Lee, Paulus, & Spence (2010) indicated that weblog offers students an opportunity to interact with minor groups to overcome the constraint of a big classroom, collaborating to build a conducive learning environment. Deng and Yuen (2011) remarked that weblogs provide opportunity for learners to express their views, thoughts and ideals in an online setting. Thompson (2017) viewed blog as internet communication tools which allow students to create their own persona or image on the World Wide Web. Schroeder (2010) examined the level of utilization of blogging to convey the useful information to the academic staff at The University of Illinois. Their findings from both qualitative and quantitative data revealed that final year students take part in the blogging activities to support blogs usage for educational purposes. Adedoja & Abimbade (2013) stated that success of blogs in education are determined by students and lecturers. Diyaolu & Rifqah (2015) carried out a research on the educational usage of web 2.0 tools among students. Their findings revealed that 50% of participants viewed blogs suitable in learning environment. Joshi & Chugh (2009) & Kim (2008 revealed that blogs improve the mode of communication between students and teachers. Kumar (2009) noted that Blogs can also be viewed as a mode of communication for active classroom communications. Churchill (2009) remarked that blogs brings about effectiveness teaching and allow learners to better control and improve their own learning. Davi (2010) & Farmer (2010) documented that Blogs can be used as collaborative tools. Farmer (2010) documented that blogs allow sharing of knowledge of topics learnt amid students, partaking in group assignments and also assist as a mean disseminating information tool, working together with teachers and students on topics learnt. Ajewole & Fashola (2012) stated that weblogs are used for posting personal diaries or updating friends in the real world. Ajewole & Fashola (2012) identified active learning, collaborative learning, higher-level thinking, and flexibility in course delivery as benefits of weblogs. Halic et al (2010) conducted a study on the perception of students on blogging. They stated that blogging improved students' learning outcome and it was also revealed that students with private blogs were more interested in blogging than students who did not have blogs. Nedeva & Nedev, (2010) remarked that Blog gives room for easy creation of a page, easy filtering of content for presentation by date or category, and it allows the blog creator to invite and add other authors to the blogs. Pi, Liao, Liu, & Hseih (2010) reported that interaction has positive impact on users of blog's perception. Churchill (2009) & Halic et al (2010 reported that blogging influences the perception of knowledge of learners in diverse backgrounds. Goktas and Demirel (2012) revealed out that the integration of blogs influence the students' Information and Communication Technology (ICT) perception positively in addition to the acquisition of ICT competencies. They also found that blogging assist teachers and students promote self-directed learning skills.
The potential of weblog use for educational purpose has been explored by many researchers outside Nigerian context as seen in the above literature. The researcher observed that there is still quite limited research on the usage of weblogs for educational purpose in Nigerian context. This study is intended to fill this research gap.

RESEARCH METHODS
The research design adopted for the study was descriptive survey. The population for this study consisted of undergraduates from the three selected tertiary institutions. The sample of this study consisted of 358 respondents which were selected using purposive sampling techniques.
The research instrument used for this study was a well self-structured questionnaire. The questionnaire was divided into two sections A and B. Section A sorted the demographic information of the respondents while Section B was designed to seek information relating to the research questions formulated on four point Likert scale of strongly agree, agree, disagree and strongly disagree. The structured questionnaire designed by the researcher were validated by experts in Educational technology and Computer Science Education to ensure the instrument measure what they were to measure. Based on the discussion with them and their offer, selected items were modified; certain items added or reduced and finalized the instrument. Cronbach alpha coefficient was used to determine the reliability of the questionnaire. To ascertain the reliability of the instrument after modification, it was administered on the students which were not part of the sample for the interval of two weeks using test-retest method. The reliability correlation yielded r=0.79 which indicated that the questionnaire tool was highly reliable.To further ensure reliability and validity of the outcomes of this paper, the researchers ensured that there were no biases and undue influence during the process of administering the questionnaire. This process adhered to the recognized procedures, which ought to be followed when coding, categorizing and analyzing data. The administration of the questionnaire was done and collected on the spot in order to facilitate quick and accurate response. The questionnaire was administered to the respondents across the institutions with the permission of the school authorities. A total of 400 questionnaires were duly administered for 400 respondents in which 358 were retrieved. The data

Analysis on Research Questions
Research Question 1: What are students' views towards the usage of weblogs for educational purposes? The result in Table 1 revealed views of students towards the usage of weblogs for educational purposes. It was indicated that nearly all (95%) the respondents agreed that Weblogs are good platform for students to share ideas and knowledge on topical issues, though 5% of them disagreed. Similarly, 94% of the respondents consented that Weblogs link student to recommended Internet resources, while only 6% of them felt contrary. Also, 63% of the respondents said Weblogs is strictly for Computer Science Students, while 37% was of a negating opinion. The result also indicated that high percentage (85.7%) of the respondents supported the statement that Blogs make learning interesting, however, only 14.3% of them did not bide the idea. 54.7% of the respondents were of the view that the negative impact of weblog are huge while 45.3% had a negative view. It was also affirmed -518-by 47% of the respondents that Weblog have no place in Education while 53% felt contrary. In a similar trend, 46.3% of the respondents supported the statement that Blogging encourage students to be lazy, while 53.7% of the respondents negated the statement. The result also revealed that 86.4% of the respondents believed that the use of blogs contributes to my understanding of computer science education while 13.6% of the respondents disagreed. The statement that Weblogs enable sharing of knowledge with classmates was supported by 91% while 9% could not support the statement. It can be concluded that large percentage of the respondents expressed positive views toward the usage of Weblogs educational purposes.

Randwick International of Education and Linguistics Science Journal
Research Question 2: What are the perceived benefits of weblogs in teaching and learning? The result in Table 2 shows the responses on the perceived benefits of weblogs in teaching and learning. It was affirmed by 95.3% of the respondents that Blogs help to provide solution to Group Assignment through enhanced interaction, although 4.7% of the respondents still felt contrary. In a similar trend, 83% of the respondents affirmed that Blogs promote reflective learning, while 17% of them did not affirm the statement. The result also revealed that 79% of the respondents agreed that Blogs promote Classroom news circulation, while 21% of them were of a negating view. That Blogs promote exchange of pictures, videos & games of concepts being taught was supported by 75.4% of the respondents, while 24.6% of them did not agree to this statement. 77.3% of the respondents agreed that blog enhance interaction between Teachers and students while

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.7% could not agree. That information transmission are made faster through blogging was also supported by 78.3% of the respondents while 21.7% did not bide the idea. Lastly, 60.6% of the respondents also affirmed that using blog has allowed me to be more focused on responding to text, while 39.4% of the respondent had a contrary opinion. Therefore, it can be concluded that solution to group assignment through enhanced interaction, enhancing interaction between teachers and students, acquiring more learning resources, transmission of information and exposure of students to more knowledge are the perceived benefits of using blogs for educational purposes.
Research Question 3: What are the constraints towards the usage of weblogs? A high number of the respondents (68.3%) affirmed that there is insufficient knowledge of Blogs, while 31.7% of them thought otherwise. Similarly, 73.4% of the respondents said weblogs is only accessible by computer literates, although 26.6% of them negated the view. High percentage of the respondents (88.3%) were also of the view that Lack of Mobile phones, Personal computers limit the use of weblogs, however, 11.7% of them felt contrary. The statement that inadequate electricity limit the use of weblog was also supported by 88.7% of the respondents, while 11.3% of them disagreed. High percentage of the respondents (80%) were also of the view that Bad internet facility limit the use of weblog in the tertiary institution, however, 20% of them felt contrary. Lastly, it was affirmed by 90% of the respondents Lack of relevant software's and poor maintenance of weblogs limit the use of weblogs among students, while 10% of them did not. Therefore, it can be concluded that the challenges faced by students in using weblogs such as insufficient knowledge of Blogs, lack of mobile phones, personal computers limit the use of weblogs, bad internet facility, inadequate electricity, lack of relevant software's and poor maintenance of weblogs limit the usage of weblogs

Discussion
Findings from research question one revealed that respondents expressed positive views toward the usage of weblogs educational purposes. This may suggest that blogs promote reflective learning and also contributes to their learning process. The result of the study is in line Okocha (2016) who stated that blogs improve students learning ability and improves the interest of students in learning.
The findings from the research questions 2 revealed that solution to group sssignment through enhanced interaction, enhancement of interaction between teachers and students, acquisition of more learning resources, transmission of information and exposure of students to more knowledge are the perceived benefits of using blogs for educational purposes. This may suggests that there are perceived benefits of the using of weblog for educational purposes. This result of the study is in agreement with Atıcı and Özmen (2011) who stated that intensive use of blogs enhances the sense of being a community, which is an important variable for group work.
The findings from the research questions 3 revealed that the challenges faced by students in using weblogs such as insufficient knowledge of blogs, lack of mobile phones, personal computers limit the use of weblogs, bad internet facility, inadequate electricity, lack of relevant software's and poor maintenance of weblogs limit the usage of weblogs. This may suggest that majority of the respondents could be said to understand the constraints towards the usage of weblogs for educational purposes. This findings is in support of the study of Okocha (2016) who reported that the constraint towards the usage of weblogs as reported by the students includes inadequate electricity, bad internet facility, lack of mobile phones and personal computers, lack of relevant software's and insufficient knowledge.

CONCLUSION
From the findings that emanated from this study, it can be concluded that students expressed positive views toward the usage of weblogs educational purposes. It can also be concluded that solution to group assignment through enhanced interaction, enhancing interaction between teachers and students, acquiring more learning resources, transmission of information and exposure of students to more knowledge are the perceived benefits of using blogs for educational purposes. Finally, the challenges faced by students in using weblogs are insufficient knowledge of blogs, lack of mobile phones, personal computers limit the use of weblogs, bad internet facility, inadequate electricity, lack of relevant software's and poor maintenance of weblogs limit the usage of weblogs.

Recommendations
Based on the findings of this study, the following recommendations are made: 1. Governments should install robust and reliable Internet (Wi-Fi) facilities through the Department of ICT Directorate in the tertiary institutions. 2. Administrators of tertiary institutions should create an enabling environment for intellectual exchange, aligning with tertiary institutions curriculum to promote the use of weblogs for educational purposes. 3. Tertiary institutions should explore the learning opportunities offered by Blogging. The package can be used in individualized learning without the barriers associated with time and space. 4. Tertiary institutions should develop her own online community forum where relevant information about their institutions can be shared.