Preliminary communication
The workload of e-instructor of Croatian as a foreign language: the case study of the e-course HiT-1
Marija Bošnjak
; Ministry of Science and Education of the Republic of Croatia
Abstract
Nowadays, more and more tasks are performed online including university
classes of foreign languages. This paper addresses the situation of instruc-
tors of Croatian as a foreign language at online course. The case study is
the first e-course of Croatian as a foreign language for the beginners, which
has been held since spring 2011. The program consists of independent learn-
ing using instructional materials prepared in the MoD system and individ-
ual and group sessions with the lectors via Skype and Webinar. Individual
classes are arranged twice a week, giving each student a total of 24 live ses-
sions. The e-instructors in the program have held more than 1,400 hours
of one-on-one online sessions. Since students come from different parts of
the world (so far 60 participants from 25 countries and all continents) and
the range of time zones from -9 to +12 hours relative to Croatian time, the
classes can not fall within regular working hours in Croatia — during the
e-course classes begin at 7 AM and last till 10 PM, sometimes from 5 AM
till midnight. This poses the question of the workload of e-instructors and
how to regard the time between the classes compared to standard language
instructors who teach the language in the classroom within the regular time
frame. Obviously, in such cases a specific workload has to be defined, simi-
lar to the doctors working in shifts or professional drivers required to take
regular rest breaks after hours of driving.
Keywords
e-course; online live sessions; different time zones; e-instructor workload
Hrčak ID:
173940
URI
Publication date:
23.12.2014.
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