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intercultural awareness in intercultural communication for them. The students wereallowed around 15 weeks to complete the ten topics. They were not expected todo the tasks each week as a degree of flexibility was needed to allow the studentstime for exams, course work deadlines and holidays; however, it was recommendedthat they followed the order of the syllabus. They were asked to contribute tofive of the discussion forums and the chat sessions were optional 2 . In total it wasexpected that the course would take around 15 hours.In relation to pedagogy, the course was primarily designed for independent studywith each of the topics containing a learning activity or object (LO) which thestudents completed by themselves. These LOs included reading tasks, podcasts,reflective activities, note-taking and comprehension checks which were scaffoldedthrough contextualisation, interactive activities and extensive written feedback (seeAppendix 1). An online glossary of key terminology was also provided. Support wasprovided from an online tutor who the students could contact through an onlinecourse forum and e-mail. Staff at Silpakorn University also provided support and theoption of talking to someone face-to-face. The interactive elements of the coursewere further complimented by the discussion forum where students could discusstheir ideas with other students and with the course tutor. The students also had theoption of taking part in three synchronous one hour chat sessions. This involveda discussion with the tutor, other students and in the case of the final session withthree students from the University of Southampton who were studying interculturalcommunication. Both the discussion forum and the chat sessions provided anopportunity for students to extend their understanding of key ideas on the coursethrough sharing ideas with both the tutor and other students.Course participationStudent No. Topics contributed to LOs Discussion Chat1 10 10 11 22 10 10 9 -3 10 10 7 -4 10 10 3 -5 10 10 1 -6 10 10 - -7 9 9 8 -8 9 5 8 -9 9 4 7 310 8 8 8 211 7 6 6 -12 7 7 4 -13 6 6 3 114 6 4 3 -Intercultural Awareness Thailand | 279