Here - EnglishAgenda - British Council

where possible, to bring them together to tackle such issues, and also to boostmotivation. Also, bringing the trainer in real contact again helped them understandthe local context even more deeply, and so build more trust with the participants.2. Delivery media and instructional modalitiesa. The face-to-face trainer was also the e-moderator. It was essential that theparticipants had a high level of trust and faith in the online trainer, feeling thatperson knew their context and their learning needs. That trust could only begained effectively during the face-to-face training.b. The internet is very slow for some links to resources outside China, so for videotasks, if videos (with copyright) could not be stored directly on our China server,tape scripts were provided to help participants.c. The course design had to take cultural differences into consideration.For instance, Chinese teachers are not used to group tasks and would bereluctant to adapt or change other groups’ or participants’ work directly.Therefore, the wiki was not successful, and discussion forums were used forpost-work comments instead.ConclusionsFeedback has been very positive, with the varied learning modes proving particularlypopular among participants.Since its first pilot in 2010, the project has been delivered with six different partnersat municipal or provincial level. The blended learning style has been welcomed byboth participants and partners, who are mainly local education authorities:I find this mode helpful and effective as it allows me to learn and practiceafter work.Shen Qing (participant from Shanghai)Through the Moodle online I really have learned a lot! I have got efficienthelp from Jeff (the trainer and E-moderator) and I have searched the internetfor PDFs and much information about testing. I will try my best to help mycolleagues and students know more about tests.One participant from NanjingThe blended learning approach has met the needs of the project and enabledparticipants to learn new skills in test writing such as:■■■■■■■■developing test specificationsusing their understanding of the advantages of certain test items to enablethem to use a wider range of itemsusing statistical tools like a discrimination index and item analysisbeing confident in their ability to write reliable and valid tests that will havea positive impact on communicative classroom teaching.It is hoped that this development of awareness, confidence and skills will havea positive impact on communicative classroom teaching in China.88 | Reversing the blend: From online to blended