Swissling - A Swiss linguistic courseware

SWISSLING is a modular introductory courseware in linguistics developed by a network of five Swiss linguistics departments -Lugano (USI), Basel, Geneva, Lausanne, Zürich, and funded by the Swiss Virtual Campus.
The SWISSLING consortium, during the SVC impulse phase, produced 12 courseware modules covering all the main subfields of the discipline that can be combined to form introductory courses in linguistics adapted to various teaching needs and usable both within blended learning scenarios and in complete distance learning contexts.
During the academic years 2001-2002, 2002-2003, 2003-2004 the modules were extensively tested within various extended blended learning scenarios in the framework of the introductory linguistics courses and seminars taught in the partner universities, each year more than 500 students used SWISSLING, with an average reduction of ex cathedra lectures near 50 percent. The methods of evaluation implemented in the blended courses integrate on-line exercises on-line collaborative work scenarios and traditional presence written examinations An internal pedagogical team (with members from ICIEF Lugano and FPSE Geneva) carried out an extensive pedagogical evaluation.
The 12 SWISSLING modules have been now migrated to the new Web-CT Vista Platform and has been used during the academic year 2004-2005 in the universities of Lugano (USI), Basel, Geneva, Lausanne, Zürich, Neuchâtel and Lyon ( France ) and Québec UQAM (Canada). The total number of students involved has been approximately 850; including 150 users in foreign universities.