Blended Learning in English Language Teaching: Course Design and Implementation

input and answer questions that had been written for each clip. Ideally, students
would have attended actual lectures in English; however, this was not practical in
Egypt. Furthermore, as it was difficult to find university lectures that related to the
coursebook on YouTube, other talks were included that did connect.
The YouTube links and classroom audio were used to complement each other. The
class work enabled students to develop their note-taking skills collectively and pay
particular attention to transition signals and keywords to help with understanding.
The physical presence of the teacher helped to support and encourage students
before and in between activities. Furthermore, students were prompted to assist
each other by sharing what they had understood from the audio. From a teacher’s
perspective, they appeared more confident with this face-to-face interaction and
were encouraged by receiving instant feedback on their answers. Nevertheless,
the online element added to this provision for different reasons. Firstly, the videos
provided flexible revision opportunities with students being able to stream or
download them in their own time. They allowed the learners to focus on their own
needs as they could individually replay sections of the video or revise skills from
particular lessons. In addition, they added authenticity to the course because
while the classroom recordings gave students valuable listening practice, they
were non-visual and presented little opportunity to understand from body language.
Actual live lectures would have been the ideal provision but as this was impossible,
the video-tasks were perceived to be more visually realistic than the classroom tasks.
As Richards (2005: 6) says, such authenticity is advisable in any listening activity.
With respect to methodology, a learner-centred blend was designed that would
encourage autonomous self-motivated personalised collective learning. As Arnold
and Ryan (2003) say, if teachers ‘…are less shackled by the need to provide students
with access to knowledge, their skills in pedagogy can be directed towards higher
level thinking abilities, and developing a climate of positive, enthusiastic learning
contexts in which rigorous intellectual work can flourish’.
The role of the teacher was therefore that of facilitator. In terms of the classroom
work, this involved encouraging students to work more autonomously by adopting
effective strategies and promoting collaborative discussion. The expectation was that
learners would primarily rely on themselves and each other and the teacher would be
present to elicit and help motivate when necessary. With respect to the online work,
the teacher posted initial questions and provided learning material but participated
in a more removed way to encourage students to take greater charge of their own
learning. When interaction fell, messages were posted to initiate more involvement.
Despite this, communication was encouraged rather than forced because of the
desire to promote self-motivated learning. As evidence indicates, learner involvement
in wikis tends to be more meaningful when they themselves choose to interact
(Azizinezhad and Hashemi, 2011: 869).
Lessons learned
The following information was obtained through teacher reflection, student feedback
from post-course questionnaires and informal comments throughout the project.
A blended learning approach to soft skill training | 203