Promoting a Culture Of Innovativeness In English Studies In Moroccan Higher Education
Edited by : Reddad Erguig
2016

Reddad Erguig

Introduction

Daouia Laaboudi and Reddad Erguig
Blending language courses: an added value

Hicham Zyad
The effects of a blended writing course on students’ writing ability

Hassan Ait Bouzid
Innovative practices in teaching the “Study Skills” course: A comparative study

Bouchaib Benzehaf
Innovative, ICT-enhanced assessment options: The cyber-coaching model as an example

Karim Bensoukas
Digital learning resource development and flipped learning: Innovative teaching of “Introductory Phonetics”

Mohamed Yeou
A comparison of blended and face-to-face approaches to teaching “Research Methods” to undergraduate students

Ikbal Zeddari
The “End-of-studies Project”: Insights into an Inquiry-Based Higher Education Pedagogy

 

 

Introduction

Since the beginning of the new reform in Higher Education in 2003 in Morocco, most educational debates have centred on offering evaluations of the implementation of the Reform. Several debates focused on identifying the challenges that hinder an effective implementation of such a reform, suggesting practical recommendations that could enhance the quality of teaching and learning in Morocco. Although they attempted to highlight future prospects and opportunities, such debates were much too concerned with the challenges and obstacles that hinder the effective teaching of English.
This special issue is a contribution to the debate revolving around the design and implementation of an effective system of higher education with special reference to English Studies. One of the strengths of the present issue of Languages and Linguistics is that it includes scholarly research articles that provide academically rigorous discussions. Another strength of this issue is that each one of the articles reports an innovative teaching experience with each one offering insights that can inform ELT teaching instruction and assessment practices. As a matter of fact, the contributors to this volume touch upon issues that challenge the effective teaching of English, yet they highlight the creative and innovative teaching and assessment experiences that challenge barriers and constraints and boost collaboration among teachers to better inform teachers’ instruction and students’ learning. The articles in this volume are of interest to scholars and professionals in the area of English language teaching.  They are also of interest to teacher-trainees and to students who plan a career in ELT in Higher Education.

× Langues et Linguistique 38 (2016), pp. i-iv.

I would like to thank all the people who contributed to the completion of this issue. Special thanks go to the contributors. I would also like to thank the general editors for the opportunity to put the articles together in this special issue. A word of thanks goes to the anonymous reviewers who kindly accepted to review the articles and provide comments and suggestions to the authors. Special thanks go to the members of the Applied Language and Culture Studies Research Laboratory (ALCS) for their dedication and professionalism during the organisation of the First National Conference, during which these papers were first presented. Special thanks are also due to Said Jebbar and Abdelkrim El Amari for their help with the translation of the introduction into Arabic and French.

 

 

Blending language courses: an added value
pp. 1-22
Daouia Laaboudi and Reddad Erguig

In the first article, Daouia Laaboudi and Reddad Erguig discuss an experience of blending in two language courses. They evaluate English-major students’ engagement in, experience of and attitudes to blending and analyse the strengths and weaknesses of this pedagogical tool used to promote learning experience. Using a mixed-methods design and Kirkpatrick's (1994) Four-Level Training Evaluation Model, they explore students’ appraisal of the two blended courses and the ways these courses promote their learning. The results they obtained indicate that students differ in the extent to which they engaged in blended courses and the degree to which they benefited from the learning opportunities they offered them. Nevertheless, blending was unquestionably an added value that contributed to actively engaging students in their own learning and to their construction of their own knowledge. The authors argue for the need to allocate sufficient funding to facilitate students’ access to technology and to organise orientation sessions to train them in how they can make the best of blending. They also emphasise the need to offer teachers professional development and train them in using technology and designing instructional software.
 
 
The effects of a blended writing course on students’ writing ability
pp. 23-40
Hicham Zyad

In the second article, Hicham Zyad contributes to research on writing by investigating the short-term effects of a blended writing course on semester-one students’ writing quality as assessed by holistic ratings and objectives measures of complexity and accuracy. The author used a Moodle platform to provide the students with supplementary materials along with face-to-face work in the classroom and to enable students to both post their assignments in group blogs and exchange feedback. The results indicate that the students’ compositions improved as a function of the effects of the blended writing course. However, the improvement affected mechanics, grammar and vocabulary but not content and organisation. The blended collaborative writing program affected accuracy more than complexity largely due to the fact that the students’ online collaborative interactions were focused on micro-level issues of writing such as mechanics, grammar and vocabulary. The author then suggests that writing courses should not be turned into grammar courses and that more efforts should instead be invested to improve students’ skills in content and organisation as well as their ability to produce adjoining clauses through practice and exposure to models written by expert writers. He also stresses the need to increase their use of all sorts of social networking technologies to extend the learning experience outside class time.
 
 
Innovative practices in teaching the “Study Skills” course: A comparative study
pp. 41-52
Hassan Ait Bouzid

Hassan Ait Bouzid’s article examines the ways in which textbook evaluation, a practice commonly used in K-12 education, can boost the quality of university course books. He investigates the ways in which the design of two course books used to teach the “Study Skills” course are innovative with regard to the selection and presentation of the course content as well as the assessment of the learning outcomes. Using a mixed-methods approach consisting of content analysis and structured interviews, the author discusses the similarities and differences as well as the strengths and weaknesses in the two course books and shows that the two course books present quasi-similar content, but they differ in the teaching approach. The author stresses the innovative aspects in the two course books, namely the involvement of the students in the design of its content and the incorporation of the latest ICT tools in the presentation of the course content.
 
 
Innovative, ICT-enhanced assessment options: The cyber-coaching model as an example
pp. 53-72
Bouchaib Benzehaf

The fourth article, by Bouchaib Benzehaf, is based on the claim that innovations based on ICT in areas such as curricula and learning objectives require similar innovations in assessment practices. The article is based on a case study of first year students’ writing products in which students were provided with instant, personalized, needs-based and descriptive feedback on the Internet as well as an analysis of students’ attitudes vis-à-vis the cyber-coaching model. The author shows that students have positive attitudes towards cyber-coaching and that their products improved in terms of overall writing performance and language use. He then stresses the importance of using cyber-coaching model as a form of online formative assessment and argues for the need to incorporate it in Moroccan higher education.
 
 
Digital learning resource development and flipped learning: Innovative teaching of “Introductory Phonetics”..........................................................
pp. 73-92
Karim Bensoukas

Karim Bensoukas’s article is concerned with the implementation of Flipped Learning as an innovative constructivist, learner-based pedagogy that uses video lectures to deliver direct content instruction and class time for one-on-one education in the teaching of “Introductory Phonetics”. After briefly describing the phonetics course content and reviewing Flipped Learning and the relevant aspects of the digital learning resources developed, the author describes the flipped phonetics project he undertook and offers an evaluation thereof. The results he obtained through an examination of students’ assessment of the implementation of Flipped Learning indicate that it was a relative success, which implies the need for the extension of Flipped Learning to other aspect of linguistics and a more systematic, in-depth study in the future.
 
 

A comparison of blended and face-to-face approaches to teaching “Research Methods” to undergraduate students
pp. 93-108

Mohamed Yeou


Mohamed Yeou’s article reports the results of a quasi-experimental study on the impact of a blended learning approach on students' performance outcomes in a “Research Methods” course at a Moroccan university. Comparing the final course grade of an experimental group of students using a Moodle LMS-supported course to access all the instruction materials and those of a control group who use exclusively face-to-face communication in class, the author notes that the experimental group had slightly higher but not statistically significant means, which might rather be accounted for by GPA. The analysis of students' log data for the experimental group revealed that only the number of online sessions and the GPA were significantly associated with final student grade. The author then concludes that blended learning is as useful and effective as face-to-face learning.
 

The “End-of-studies Project”: Insights into an Inquiry-Based Higher Education Pedagogy
pp. 109

Ikbal Zeddari


The final article, by Ikbal Zeddari’, is concerned with the end-of-studies project at the English department, Mohammed V University in Rabat. Based on an information-seeking behaviour survey with undergraduate students, the author examines students’ conceptions of and the difficulties they face in the research process. The results he obtained indicate that students approach the research task constructively and evaluate their experiences positively. The students reported gains and improvements in conceptual knowledge, linguistic proficiency, and technical skills as well as their academic self-appraisals and affective traits. However, they faced several obstacles consisting in information-related problems, negative internal factors, and variable skill level in research. The author eventually argues for the need to integrate research skills across the curriculum.

 
 

In conclusion, the different articles in this issue offer scholarly discussions of tested teaching practices that may hopefully be borrowed and adapted in different educational settings and classroom experiences. Thus, this issue is a platform designed to foster a sense of collegiality among university teachers. Alternative pathways towards the development of such collegiality and the promotion of quality teaching in Higher Education will hopefully be the focus of future research.