Page 64 - BLENDED LEARNING

Comments on Part 1

Brian Tomlinson

The four chapters in Part 1 all describe blended learning EAP courses for university
students. Their countries and contexts are very different but the chapters share
many features in common. They are all reports of pioneering courses and report their
procedures, problems, solutions and ongoing development in ways which should be
of great help to any EAP university teachers intending to develop blended learning
courses for their institutions.

All four courses reported seemed to have been developed as pragmatic solutions
to problems rather than as principled attempts at pedagogic innovation. In all four
institutions the main problems facing the teachers were the large size of the classes,
the inadequacy of the class time allocated to the courses and the differing needs
and language levels of the students. As in most EAP courses throughout the world
the main challenge was for a small number of teachers to help a large number
of students to become effective users of academic English in a very short time.
The face-to-face elements of the courses reported in Part 1 enabled the students
to get to know each other, to become familiar with the objectives and procedures of
the courses, to develop a shared community, and to be provided with the reassurance
and reinforcement best achievable in one-to-one and in group face-to-face interaction.
The online elements of the courses added massively to the on-task time the students
were able to devote to the courses, provided opportunities for far more exposure to,
and use of, English than purely face-to-face courses could, allowed for individualised
tasks and feedback and allowed the students to both work in their own time at their
own pace and to collaborate with other students on shared projects in ways which
they could not have done in the classroom.
The decision to introduce the four courses and the way they were initially
developed might have been determined largely by pragmatic considerations but
many pedagogic benefits of blended learning courses and many principles and
guidelines for their development emerged as the courses progressed. All the courses
reported positive motivation, provided the courses got the balance right between
face-to-face and online delivery, they all reported the benefits of students being
able to receive ongoing feedback from both their peers and their teachers and they
all reported an increase in the perceived relevance of the courses. Of course, not
everything which was introduced was appreciated and benefited from by all the
students. Some did not like talking to machines, some did not appreciate having to
post their contributions for peer feedback and collaboration to meet demanding
deadlines, and some did not always appreciate the extra workload which blended
learning courses can impose.

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