Effects Of Blended Learning On College English Learners’ Oral Production

Recent years have seen the great prevalence of blended learning(BL)in the educational field in China and abroad.However,the effects of BL are plagued by controversies.In the research field of second language(L2)teaching and learning,empirical studies on the effects of BL on L2 learners’ oral production are still scarce,and the studies which provide a complete picture of the effects of BL on college English learners’ oral production regarding complexity,accuracy and fluency(CAF)have not been conducted.Therefore,the present study aims to explore the effects of BL on college English learners’ oral production regarding CAF and further elaborate the relationship among CAF.Fifty two sophomores from two classes in a key comprehensive university in Jiangsu Province,China participated in this study with 24 students in the experimental group(EG)and 28 students in the control group(CG).The students in the EG received BL instruction while the students in the CG only received face-to-face instruction.Both groups attended a pre-test and a post-test at the beginning and the end of the semester.Based on the analysis of CAF,two major findings are reported.(1)The differences in complexity including word variation and syntactic complexity,accuracy and fluency between the EG and CG did not reach a significant level at the post-test,while the students in the CG outperformed the students in the EG regarding complexity in lexical frequency breadth.(2)In the EG,the indicator of fluency(the ratio of pruned length to total length)correlated positively with the indicator of complexity(the mean length of T-unit)at the pre-test and post-test.The indicator of fluency(articulation rate)and the indicator of complexity(lexical frequency breadth)correlated negatively with the indicator of accuracy(the percentage of correct verb use),and the indicator of fluency(repairs per 100 syllables)correlated positively with the indicator of complexity(the mean length of T-unit)at the post-test.In the CG,the indicator of fluency(repairs per 100 syllables)correlated positively with the indicator of complexity(the mean length of T-unit)at the pre-test.The indicator of fluency(speaking rate)correlated negatively with the indicator of accuracy(percentage of correct verb use)at the post-test.The indicator of complexity(lexical complexity)did not improve at the expense of fluency in both groups at the pre-test and the post-test.It is implied that BL did not show an advantage in improving college English learners’ oral production regarding CAF in the present study.As effective designs of BL can evolve only through cycles of practice,evaluation and reflection,further practices of BL in college English teaching and learning need to be done in the future.