Blended Learning in English Language Teaching: Course Design and Implementation

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Blended learning:
The IDLTM experience
Ron White, Andy Hockley, Stephen Heap and George Pickering
Background
Ten years ago, the International Diploma in Language Teaching Management (IDLTM),
whose origins are based on an earlier advanced diploma (ADLTM), was launched.
With tripartite design and ownership, viz., Cambridge ESOL, ICTE-UQ, SIT World
Learning, the certificates are triple badged. The course has been delivered by ICTE-
UQ (Australia), SIT (US) and International House Barcelona, in Australia, Brazil, Oman,
Spain, Turkey and Vietnam. Typically, it is individuals who enrol, but courses for
closed groups are also provided.
The course attracts managers/leaders and prospective managers locally and
internationally, both native and non-native English speakers (the latter with a
minimum of IELTS 7 or equivalent). There is a maximum of 12 participants per course
and well over 200 have successfully completed the course since 2001.
The IDLTM was designed in response to indications that there was a demand for a
management course which, by being made available in blended learning mode would
enable participants to combine study with work, a benefit valued by the students
surveyed by Heinze and Procter (2004). In the IDLTM, such blending also facilitates
professional development by being relatively long term, collaborative and school
based (Hiebert, Gallimore and Stigler, 2002, cited by Owston, Sinclair and Wideman,
2008). It was also felt that a blended learning approach would allow participants more
time to study management theory and to relate it to their own context. Furthermore,
as Garrison and Kanuka (2004) argue ‘the combination of face-to-face and online
learning can result in a transformative learning experience … because course
participants can benefit from being connected to a learning community regardless
of whether they are physically apart and together’ (Owston, Sinclair and Wideman,
2008). Finally, with the predicted expansion of computer mediated training and
learning, there was a belief that blended learning course delivery would contribute
to the information literacy of participants, and that, as Dziuban, Hatman, and Moskal
(2004: 3) point out, albeit in the context of undergraduate teaching, this would be of
‘benefit to them throughout their entire academic and employment careers’.
After several iterations, the current model was established:
■■ A two-week face-to-face phase, usually of two consecutive weeks, this being the
maximum time most managers can be away from work.
■■ Six-month online tuition and assessment for the eight course modules.
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