Product Description

"Blended Learning" provides the flexibility to accommodate the varied requirements of pedagogies, disciplines and levels of course, together with the needs of a wide variety of learners. However, anyone concerned with the integration of online tutoring to support students appropriately may need to reassess current practice.This book adopts a pragmatic and commonsense approach to blended learning, by situating the use of online media within a well-grounded teaching and learning strategy. It provides practical ideas for the successful implementation of blended strategies, including good practice in both asynchronous and synchronous tutoring, appropriate assessment design for developing successful blended learners, and innovative approaches to professional development for distance tutors. It is illustrated with a wide variety of examples and comments from students and practitioners in both distance and campus based environments in thirteen different countries.Since the first edition was published in 2006, there has been great interest in Web2 technologies and their potential for use in an educational environment. This second edition has therefore incorporated many new examples of good practice, making use of a combination of tried and tested tools as well as blogs and wikis for supporting students. There has also been a recent rise in the use of activity based learning and interest in its potential for supporting students in distance and online environments. The new edition incorporates many new exemplars of learning activity design in Part Three, to illustrate approaches to the development of critical and independent learners.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #221349 in Books
• Published on: 2008-04-25
• Original language: English
• Binding: Paperback
• 222 pages

About the Author
Dr Janet Macdonald is Learning and Teaching Coordinator for the Open University in Scotland.

Customer Reviews

Blended learning - a good practice guide
This book does what is says on the cover - it offers a good practice guide to supporting learning online. It is realistic and mercifully free of outlandish claims for online teaching methods. Instead teachers and instructional designers interested in online learning will find a mass of practical advice, strategies and 'bright ideas' much of which is derived from Open University experience

A great and jargon free guide to blended learning and student support
This is an excellent and jargon-free book which contains lots of good ideas about how to use and make the most of blended learning. Relevant to practioners and others with an interest in pedagogy and student support in distance and campus based environments, it represents a pragmatic and grounded guide to developing and using blended learning, and incorporates a wealth of relevant examples, illustrations, and comments from tutors and students - all of which help to demystify the subject and really bring it to life.

watch for 2nd ed
just a note to say that the second edition is due to be published in paperback on 25th April. The full title is: Blended learning and online tutoring.Planning Learner Support and Activity Design. There seems to be some error on the Amazon website.