The challenge
With technological advancements and the increasingly frantic pace of daily life, finding time for traditional English classes—in a classroom at a fixed time and duration—can be a difficult task. Fortunately, online study alternatives exist to better suit your busy schedule.
Taking English classes online has many advantages. Timing is flexible, the student has access to the learning materials at all times, processes are more personalized, and courses are faster and cheaper. However, there are some downsides, such as a lack of interaction and face-to-face supervision, at-home distractions, and technological issues.
In order to take advantage of both types of learning, Grupo Educativo Siglo XXI, a private Mexican educational institute that offers high school programs, decided to keep its in-person English classes and complement them with Slang’s online courses to try to reduce dropout rates among their students.
The solution
Two main draws of partnering with Slang were the affordable prices and the platform’s ability to make dynamic difficulty adjustments to suit each user. In addition, the high quality of our professional content and the wide variety of topics we cover match the range of specializations offered by the university.
The choice to implement a blended teaching strategy allowed students to continue to have the advantages of face-to-face classes with English teachers, while also studying technical content in an engaging and personalized way.
The program started with a group of 500 undergraduate students enrolled in a variety of majors. After just two months, the program was yielding such positive results that another 250 students from the Psychology and Nutrition departments were also enrolled.
By the end of 2019, over 700 students were studying with Slang. Achieving a learner base of this size facilitated the success of Grupo Educativo Siglo XXI’s program through community interaction and improved student retention.
In 2020, the university expanded the program again. This new cohort of 250 includes students enrolled in either the postgraduate course at Unipre or the medical course offered in partnership with the Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México (UNAM – the National Autonomous University of Mexico). An important factor in the success of the program was the hands-on training that Slang provided on the benefits and best practices of a blended learning environment.
Further contributing to the program’s success was Slang’s Learning Management System (LMS), a tool that allows teachers to easily track study time, learning activities submitted, and overall student progress on the platform. Insights like these can be used to assess student progress, as well as to customize each student’s learning experience. Our academic advisors worked closely with teachers to adapt classroom methodologies and efficiently integrate Slang content into lesson plans. For example, some teachers used a flipped classroom model in which students could share and practice what they learned on the platform to make in-person classes more interactive.
Grupo Educativo Siglo XXI has successfully transitioned to a completely hybrid English teaching model. This success story demonstrates how feasible it is to implement genuinely personalized English training across departments and specializations in a short amount of time, provided the right guidance and tools.
The success of this implementation was based on the results of students studying the following courses:
The results
At the end of the program, these were the results obtained by Siglo XXI’s students:
“The Slang platform has a wide variety of topics available. That enhances processes and allows students to explore many aspects of the English language, not only allowing for deeper learning in class but also during individual study.”
Andrés Carbajal Bourgeois
Language Coordinator
Like Grupo Educativo Siglo XXI, you can count on Slang’s help to equip your students with the English they need for their professional future. Start the conversation with us here.
