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This paper discusses a recent study on how Communication Skills 1 subject is taught at Centro Escolar University, Philippines using BLENDED instruction, which is a combination of classroom and online delivery of education. Guided by Bersin's concept of Blended teaching strategy, the researchers came up with their modified concept of blended instruction delivery for their experimental study using internet and computers. The study used ten (10) sections of three hundred seventy five (375) college students in two campuses, five of which comprised the experimental group that were exposed to the blended instructional activities and the other five (5), the control group, used the traditional textbooks in their designated classrooms. Five teachers trained for blended instruction were selected to handle one each experimental and control groups that are comparable. The study tried to find out how comparable were the control and experimental groups with regard to their final grades and posttests using several statistical measures. The results showed that the students exposed to blended instruction performed better than the control group with .000 significance interpreted as very significant.
Keywords: Blended Teaching, Online Learning, CEU, Centro Escolar University, Arlene Opina.
INTRODUCTION
Paul Myers pioneered the term BLENDED LEARNING IN 2000. He incorporated blended learning strategies in websites called "Course Companion" for the research training of BBC.
In the context of higher education, Heinze and Procter define Blended Learning as learning facilitated by effective combination of different modes of delivery, models of teaching and styles of learning.1 Blended Learning can be applied to the integration of e-leaning with Leaning Management System (LMS) using computers in the physical classroom, along with face to face instruction. In this study, the teachers begin their classes with a well-structured introductory lesson in the classroom, and then proceed with the follow-up materials online. Based on the preassessment on the students' competencies, their nature and location, and the resources available, they decided that blogging, conferencing, quizzes, reinforcements such as games and other activities related to the learning objectives, as well as related sites are online, and the presentation of the lesson and classroom activities are offline.
It is the right mix of technologies and integration that result a socially supported and constructive learning experience. While there are many drawbacks of pure online and...