Enriching the Linguistic Concept Development of English Undergraduates Through Covid-Induced Blended Learning Practices: A Design- Based Research Perspective

Abstract

This paper investigates the incorporation of blended-learning instructional design into an academia-level linguistic course of Contrastive Phonetics and Phonology as an effective and localised measure to suit the shift from the physical classroom to online learning during the COVID-19 pandemic. This course followed the principle of design-based learning. The research examines the ensuing revision of pedagogical intervention on three subsequent course iterations, taking place both under pandemic restrictions and in the post-pandemic reality, as well as the participants’ opinions and attitudes towards the changed instructional paradigm. Using a mixed quantitative and qualitative methodology, the data were collected from the participants’ final exam marks, their comments in course evaluation surveys and from semi-structured interviews. The findings reveal the multi-aspectual effectiveness of the hybrid design and the participants’ favourable attitude towards the revised course design, thus proving that this could be a new, post-pandemic course formula.