Blended Learning in English Language Teaching: Course Design and Implementation

Figure 5: Learner comment about correcting mistakes
Traditional exam practice activities were completed in class which required time
for marking and return of papers which meant that learners would only see their
own performance. As we approached the exam, I pushed the use of the wiki writing
page and added new exam style writing tasks every week. This was popular and was
revised (edited) a total of 51 times; 29 of these revisions were made by eight different
students between 30 March and 31 May. I expect that this page was so popular as
some learners felt nervous about their abilities to pass the writing paper and the
wiki affords unlimited opportunities for writing, with the potential for immediate
feedback from whoever logs in. I made 23 of the revisions either by adding tasks
or giving feedback.
When the page began, some learners wrote individual answers to a task leading
to three similar letters on the page. This may be due to a desire for recognition for
individual work as in traditional assessment (Lund, 2008). To promote collaboration,
in class I demonstrated editing by taking the best phrases and most suitable words
from each letter to create a better answer. This seemed to convince the learners
that working together with their individual strengths and weaknesses would result in
better answers and they would learn more than when working alone (see Figure 6).
It did require courage from learners who made the first attempt on tasks. A class
needs to have trust, plus some risk takers or confident individuals.
Figure 6: Comparing student revisions of a writing task
168 | Using a wiki to enhance the learning experience on a business English course