Abstract:

This article addresses the new paradigms in the field of Second Language Teaching in Higher Education. It begins by presenting an overview of traditional and modern Learning Theories and comparing both within new tendencies in the field of teaching and learning, specially, a Second Language. Briefly, the article describes the history of online education (E-Learning and B-Learning) as a context and framework for understanding the state of the art today, including the use of the Internet related technologies for collaborative learning. The article, then, explores the potentialities of emerging technologies such as “Video-Web” and “3D Virtual Worlds” as possible environments that may enhance communicative skills in Second Language and Foreign Languages for Specific Purposes. Finally, the article concludes by presenting and discussing the insights of forty students from a class of English for Pharmaceutical Sciences which was taught in a mix of traditional and blended learning. This experience, done during this last academic semester, was a mixture of 50% in-class delivery time and 50% of online lectures and activities. The insights of these students were reported in a questionnaire and aim to understand what was more or less successful in Language Acquisition with regards to the four skills as well as their opinion towards new Learning methods.

Keywords:

Learning Theories, Second Language Teaching, New shifts and Challenges, Internet and Language Learning, Collaborative Learning, b-learning.