MOOCs’ Impacts on College English Course and the Countermeasures

M & D FORUM
MOOCs’ Impacts on College English Course and the
Countermeasures
TAN Shuwen 1, SUN Ailing 2
1. Foreign Language Department, Shandong Institute of Business and Technology, P.R.China, 264005
2. Economic Management Department, Yantai Vocational College, P.R.China, 264005
[email protected]
Abstract: As an emerging online study platform, MOOCs are bringing unprecedented impacts on
China’s higher education. MOOCs, boasting massive open online resources, become the most suitable
online platform for the college public elementary courses, such as college English for non-English major
students. The thriving of MOOCs pushes forward the reform of college English courses in the teaching
mode, teaching means and puts the students in the center of the class. Meanwhile, MOOCs have their
own disadvantages, so it seems impossible to replace the traditional English classes in the near future.
Thus college English teachers should seize the opportunity to improve their teaching design, establish
excellent teaching team and make full use of the MOOCs, making MOOCs a beneficial supplement to
the traditional English classes.
Keywords: MOOCs, College English reform, Countermeasures
1 Introduction
MOOCs are short for the massive open online courses. Being an emerging online study platform,
MOOCs have developed quickly in recent years. In the fall of 2011, about 160,000 persons registered a
free online course “Introduction to Artificial Intelligence” provided by Stanford University, [1] opening a
new chapter for the education revolution around the world. Many well-known educational institutions
and universities started to build their own MOOCs, including the well-known “three carriages” of
MOOCs—Coursera, edX and Udacity. As one pillar of MOOCs, Coursera has been co-operating with
many elite universities, such as Stanford University, Princeton University, offering free online courses to
students. MOOCs cover various categories of courses, ranging from humanity to science. Students can
register online, choose the courses that they are interested in and begin to study anytime and anywhere.
MOOCs are in the beginning and exploratory stage in China. In May 21, 2013, six first-class
universities in Asian, including Peking University and Tsinghua University, join the edX online courses
program. In the following July 8, 2013, Shanghai Jiatong University and Fudan University signed an
agreement with Coursera to build their MOOCs platform and upload their excellent courses in Chinese
or English version. Chen Jining, President of Tsinghua University said: “online courses provide a new
way of spreading knowledge and learning, which will inevitably cause a major reform of higher
education all over the world.” [2]
With the development of the Internet, MOOCs will attract more and more and attention. The current
researches are mainly about MOOCs’ impacts on China’s higher education overall, while specific
researches on MOOCs’ impacts on college English teaching are few. What impacts will MOOCs have
on the traditional college English courses? How will college English teachers, especially those who
teach non-English major students, use this new online platform? This thesis will talk about MOOCs’
impacts on English elementary courses from the aspects of teaching mode, teaching means and
teacher-students roles as well as pointing out those college English teachers should make use of MOOCs
by improving the teaching design and building excellent teaching teams to meet the challenge.
2 MOOCs’ Impacts on the College English Course
Since Ministry of Education started the reform of college English courses in 2003, China’s higher
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education institutions have taken great efforts in the improvement of college English teaching and
achieved significant results. Wang Shouren and Wang Haixiao (2011) noted that on the teaching method,
most of the universities acknowledged the mode of “classroom learning plus online learning”. The
questionnaire shows people who think this teaching mode “effective” or “very effective” account for
88.6%. Wang Zhe and Xia Jimei (2010) pointed out that in the college English reform of Sun Yat-sen
University, it is found that the combination of online learning and classroom learning improves the
efficiency of class, encourages students to study independently and sustainably, and promotes the
general education in foreign language. [3] These researches show that it is an effective way to combine
classroom learning with online learning in the future.
Nowadays, information technology becomes an indispensable part of school campus. Students can study
and communicate through the Internet in their dormitories, at the library and laboratory. Under this
context, various online study platforms emerge at the right moment, among which, MOOCs are the most
popular. With their unique advantages, MOOCs have produced profound effects on the college English
courses in China: on the platform, first-class universities provide massive qualified online courses for
the students for free, which will definitely attract thousands of English learners in China because it
provides an opportunity for these students to experience authentic abroad classes without paying
expensive tuitions; students can decide what they want to learn as well as when and where to learn these
courses. Students can even enjoy these excellent courses at home; the Internet technology provides
multiple choices of learning tools and resources. These advantages will push forward the reform of
college English courses, causing “a digital tsunami” [4] in China’s higher education. For the college
teachers who teach elementary courses, like computer technology and English, they need review the
courses, change their teaching mode and put students the center of the class.
2.1 To improve the teaching mode
At present the English teachers give lectures in the class and explain the same key points over and over
again. The teaching materials and PPT can be used repeatedly. The teachers play the dominant role in
the class while students are not able to participate in the class actively. It is hard for students to master
English without using it in practical life. Although the computer-aided teaching is available, the teachers
mostly use the online platform to assign homework. The students submit their homework online once
they have finished it. This learning process is to review and test what they have learned in class.
However, MOOCs have realized the perfect combination between classroom learning and online
learning, making an ideal online teaching mode. Differed from the previous open online courses, it is not
simply shooting the classroom teaching activity and put the video on the website. MOOCs have a whole
set of teaching mode and evaluation criteria, including lecture illustrating, group discussion, submitting
the homework, feedback, self-evaluation and self-test. At the end of each course, the teacher will have a
test and the students’ grades will be included in their school report and can be converted into credits.
Moreover, if students pass the test, they can get certification of this course recognized by the related
universities. Another advantage about MOOCs is that the course is divided into several micro lectures.
These micro lectures are organized in various forms. It can take the form of automatically play PPT,
consisting of letters, pictures and music; or it is a piece of the teacher’s teaching video; or it is a play
adapted to the teaching contents to make the lecture interesting and vivid. MOOCs provide a good
opportunity for the reform of college English course. Professor Wen Qiufang of Beijing International
Studies University noted that the university should cut down the English teaching semesters and
increase the frequency of English courses, as well as provide online learning resources for students’
independent study until they graduate. [5] With the further reform of college English course, the way of
combining classroom learning and online learning will become dominant. Thus the teachers should
change their usual way of teaching for the purpose of examination, instead they will become the anchor
of the classroom, listening to the students, enlightening students, answering students’ questions and
summarizing and so on.
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2.2 To improve the teaching means
As an indispensable part of teaching activity, teaching means refer to the tools used to communicate
between teachers and students and facilitating the teaching activity, including the teaching tools,
facilities and equipments. The English teachers often give lectures through PPT, and sometimes the
blackboard is used. Using PPT is more efficient and time-saving, thus it becomes the first choice of
English teachers. Due to the limited class hours, the teachers have to talk all the time to finish the
schedule on time. During this period, the students have to listen to the teachers and make notes. Even if
they have doubt, they will not raise the question in class because it will interrupt the teaching process.
Moreover, what the teachers said in class can not be retained for a long time. When students review
what they have learned in class, they can only rely on the PPT or the notes. However, MOOCs make up
for this shortage by keeping the teaching video for a long time. If students don’t understand certain
knowledge points, they can watch the video several times until they figure it out. When talking about
certain issues or involving some scenario, the teachers can relive the scenario, simplify the complicated
questions. Students also get to experience how English is used in daily life by making dialogue or
watching a play. MOOCs also provide large amount of listening, speaking, reading and writing materials
for students. Once students have finished certain exercises, their performance can be evaluated by the
evaluation software, which will help students know their current English level. They can compare their
grades with their peers to better aware their learning status. Students can share their opinion on MOOCs,
preview the text and make course-related presentation. They will not passively receive knowledge from
teachers; instead they will actively spread knowledge using their intelligent devices, such as smart
phone or the personal computer. They can upload process or storage useful information from the Internet.
They can study English at any time or place as long as they get access to the online resources. In this
way, MOOCs will encourage students to learn English and improve the learning efficiency.
2.3 To put students “the center of the class”
MOOCs can flip the classroom, putting students “the center of class”. Vice president of Fudan
University, Lu Fang believed that MOOCs’ flipped classroom can change the mode of “teacher being
the center of the classroom” to the mode of “students being the center of the classroom”, and make
school education focus on intelligent education instead of knowledge instilling. [6] Taking the example of
New Horizon College English Course, the book has ten units which need to be learned within 64
learning hours. Due to the tight schedule, the teacher has to spend more time explaining the content of
the text and pay less attention on the interaction between the teacher and students. Students can not
participate in the classroom actively. In addition, what students’ learned in class is not closely related to
the practical use in daily life. So their interest in learning English is becoming less and less. MOOCs
make learning English more exciting. The teacher uploads the teaching video which to the Internet. The
video is short and neat, and it has preview questions for students to answer. The students watch the
video before class, and then they can have plenty of time discussing about certain questions and express
their opinion. By this way, the teacher can enlighten and inspire the students instead of teaching
mechanically. And students throw themselves into the class and learn attentively. Through MOOCs,
students are able to choose the courses that they are interested in and get free education from the most
famous universities in the world. The students can learn from each other as well as from the teachers.
Each course will have an audition video of five-minute so that students can watch this video in advance.
If they are interested in the contents and the teacher’s teaching style, they can register the class and
become a formal student. MOOCs make it easier for students to choose any teacher’s course from any
university at any time and place. There won’t be such situation that students can not enroll in certain
courses because of number limitations. The two-way selection between teachers and students promotes
the teachers improve their teaching method and teaching quality to attract more students. Meanwhile,
the students become more interested in independent learning and make better use of their time to make
their study plan and enrich their knowledge system.
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3 Countermeasures on College English Teacher Using MOOCs
MOOCs have their advantages as well as shortcomings, thus it is impossible for them to replace the
traditional classroom learning in a short time. Moreover, MOOCs are not suitable for all the students.
For example, only those who have a solid English level can catch up with some courses that are taught
entirely in English. In addition, the college students differ in the independent learning ability and
self-control ability, thus it is hard for all the students follow the flow of the MOOCs courses. For
instance, the Stanford University’s course Introduction of Artificial Intelligent has about 160,000
registers, but those who have finished the course are only 7,157 persons with the passing rate of 5% or
so. [7] As is known to all, higher education institutions, such as colleges and universities, not only
perform the function of cultivating talents, but also have the function of scientific research, social
service and culture lead. The virtuous teachers being role models and the interaction between students
crave a harmonious atmosphere. The friendship bonded between teachers and students are most valuable,
yet this relationship can not be built from MOOCs. Therefore, college English teachers should use
MOOCs as a helpful supplement to the traditional classroom teaching to build an efficient online study
platform for students.
3.1 To improve the teaching design
A period of English class is 45 minutes, during which students can not be concentrated all the time.
However, if students missed some key points, there would be no way to turn back the clock and listen to
the teacher once again. In the long run, students would find it hard to catch up with the teachers, thus
losing their interest in studying English. MOOCs shoot the teaching process for students to watch over
and over again. Each video is cut into ten-minute or so “micro-lecture”, in which there are many
questions to answer. Only students answer the questions, can they continue to watch the video. This is
like playing computer games, adding interest and challenge to the boring study. Students would rack
their brains to figure out a way to next phase. If students could not answer the questions, they can ask
for help online. Usually, answers will be given within 5 minutes by teachers or other students. Teachers
or teaching assistants will answer students’ questions online. If students have puzzles, they can post a
message on the discussion board and their confuses will be solved in about 5-minute. Students can
decide their own learning speed and time span to make their study efficient.
Take the Five Symbols of American Culture from the book New Horizon College English Course as an
example, these five symbols can be divided into five micro-lectures. In each micro-lecture, the teacher
introduces the form and development of one symbol, prerequisite the questions and tell students to
master the key phrases and sentence patterns. Various teaching means can be used in each micro-lecture,
such as PPT, video and handout, to comprehensively show each symbol. Finally, the teachers assign a
composition My Favorite Cultural Symbol. Students can use what they have learned to finish the
writing.
3.2 To build an excellent teaching team
Most of the time, college English teachers work on teaching and scientific research by their own. Except
taking part in the activities organized by Foreign Language Department or teaching and research section,
college English teachers seldom have time to sit together and exchange their opinions. Each teacher has
his/her own way of teaching. Once in a while, the office of teaching affairs organizes observation class
for teachers to learn from each other, but there is little effect. To prepare for Education Ministry’s
evaluation, college and universities recruit a large number of postgraduates’ English teachers. Wang
Haixiao pointed out that among the college English teachers, those with a postgraduate degree account
for 53.5%. [8] These teachers face double pressure from teaching and doing scientific research. On the
one hand, they need to have further study to get Ph.D. degree; on the other hand, they have to teach
students well. That’s why teachers are lack of teamwork.
MOOCs will strengthen the co-operation between college English teachers. An excellent MOOCs
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course needs many parts to work together. Usually, to make a course, a project manager need to
coordinate the whole process of course-making; the teacher should be high-spirited and fully prepared
for the teaching process; the teaching assistants need to revise students’ homework and answer their
questions patiently; the photographers need to shoot the teaching video carefully and skillfully; the
technical support is in need of maintaining the website. MOOCs intensify the competition between
teachers as well as provide an opportunity for teachers to work together. According to Professor Li
Xiaoming from Peking University, in the future a course provided by Peking University will have
100,000 registers and to teach the lesson well, there is in need of one lecturer, three counselors and five
teaching assistants. [9] MOOCs will promote the development of the teachers and improve the teacher’s
teaching skill. In this way, students will get most benefits from these progresses.
4 Conclusion
MOOCs have injected vitality to the development of college elementary courses and provide an ideal
platform for the teachers to spread humanity knowledge and enlighten people’s mind. An excellent
college English teacher will attract students from all over the world. That thousands of students get
access to online courses for free will help to achieve fair education and provide a way to solve the
uneven distribution of China’s education resources. To attract more students, college English teachers
should change the teaching mode, teaching means and put students in the center of the class. At the
same time, they should make full use of MOOCs; combine the online learning with classroom learning
to achieve better teaching effect. Currently MOOCs are on the starting point in China and facing many
problems. But as a new online learning platform, MOOCs, having very strong vitality, are irreversible
trend of the reform of college English courses in the future.
Author in Brief:
Tan Shuwen, female, English teacher in Shandong Institute of Business and Technology, graduated
from Ocean University of China, 2012; major in English-Chinese comparative translation and
interpretation.
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