5.2.1
Direct stakeholders
Training providers in blended learning Training providers are pivotal in coordinating the different stakeholders in designing and delivering BL. They engage curriculum designers and adult educators to design and deliver BL for the enrolled learners. They need to provide the infrastructure and technical support if there is tech-enabled learning. In addition, they need to liaise with industry partners if there is workplace learning in BL. They also need to respond to policy changes to survive in the market. As a result, training providers may be one of the most important players to influence learners’ sense-making in BL. Specifically, to enable the seamless sense-making experience for learners, training providers may need to consider the following: 1. Establish constructive interactions among learners, curriculum designers, adult educators and industry partners to understand one another better for enhancing the learners’ sense-making experience; 2. Use a team approach to design BL requiring the team (curriculum designers, adult educators and industry partners) to meet often to secure a consistent narrative and clear connection between and across different modules and/or module components and materials; and 3. Pay freelance adult educators extra hours to develop the consistent narratives across the modules. If training providers take the above recommendations into consideration, the adult educators, curriculum designers and industry partners may consider the following recommendations in designing and delivering BL to enable seamless sense-making for the learners. Adult educators and curriculum designers in blended learning Adult educators are the executors in delivering the BL. As revealed in the findings, learners tend to experience seamless sense-making if they are offered more opportunities to share ideas, gain different perspectives from others and are exposed to different authentic tasks and settings. In addition, the curriculum design of BL plays a significant role in adult learners’ sense-making experiences. How the different components of BL are structured for each course results in different sense-making experience for the learners, and the industry experiences of curriculum designers may also influence the relevance of the curriculum to industry standards. Last but not least, learners’ seamless sense-making in BL requires the most attention from curriculum designers. To enable curriculum design and delivery of BL that supports deep and seamless sense-making, adult educators and curriculum designers may consider to: 1. promote communication between adult educators and workplace supervisors on the platforms built up by training providers and employers to: a. share and obtain input into course design and facilitation; and
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