Abstract:

Preparing bilingual graduates to advance society is a key mission for Zayed University, based in Dubai and Abu Dhabi. Students with an IELTS of 5.5 can be admitted directly (via a foundation colloquy sequence of courses, including English composition) to the major of their choice, otherwise they are required to undertake an Academic Bridge Program, that is a year (previously 2) of intensive English learning to meet this criterion. These IELTS levels are low by international standards, and the IELTS figure is an average, meaning that a good (speaking) ability can compensate for a poor (writing) ability.

Furthermore, once students begin their majors, together with the increase in specialized vocabulary, the increased frequency of rarer, nuanced, and sesquipedelian terms (both for field specific and non-specific technical vocabulary) means that students require ongoing language support. This has hitherto not been systematically provided, leading to writing strategies based not around professional level writing requirements but around general essay form writing and the paraphrasing of extant texts, often to the point of meaninglessness.

Accordingly, the authors, two experienced EAP and ESL practitioners and an IT Professor, have been involved in developing strategic support for the College of Technological Innovation (CTI) covering a range of Business/IT majors with the aim of developing a model for other colleges teaching content-based courses that also require language support, both proactive and remedial.

In this paper and its corresponding oral presentation, we describe some of the targeted activities introduced within CTI based around blended learning, using both face to face and application based support.

Keywords:

Technologically Enhanced Learning, Language Learning, Blended Learning, Language Support, Research-Based Instruction, Self-Access Learning.