Enhancing Students' Language Skills through Blended Learning

This paper presents a case study of using blended learning to enhance students' language skills and learner autonomy in an Asian university environment. Blended learning represents an educational environment for much of the world where computers and the Internet are readily available. It combines self-study with valuable face-to-face interaction with a teacher. This study puts the spotlight on learning outcomes in an English for Specific Purposes (ESP) class in Thailand in which e-learning strategies are used in parallel with traditional classroom language teaching methods of the four language learning skills. These skills are listening, speaking, reading and writing. The achievements and attitudes of students were compared between the control group and the experimental group to measure the potential of available technology to develop language skills and learner autonomy. The findings from this study show that online practice is directly beneficial to enhance the four language learning skills as well as autonomous learning and learner motivation.