Blended Learning Strategies for English for Specific Purposes (ESP): A Systematic Review

Abstract

The COVID-19 pandemic has brought great changes to language teaching models including English for specific purposes (ESP). The “emergency teaching models” came into being replacing traditional face-to-face teaching. Blended learning as one of these models has played an important role during this special period as well as brought some challenges. With the advent of the post-pandemic era, can this blended learning model arise as a new normal in the ESP context? Therefore, this study aims to summarize and analyze the relevant research on blended learning in the ESP context since 2019 in the hope of providing a direction or implication for future ESP research and teaching. This paper uses PRISMA to conduct a systematic review. Four international databases (Web of Science, ScienceDirect, SCOPUS, ProQuest) and Google Scholar were searched until February 2023, and 25 research articles were finally yielded. It is concluded that 2020 saw a dramatic growth in the number of relevant studies, which is believed to be closely linked to the pandemic. Asia contributed the largest number of studies. Furthermore, relatively few studies focused on blended learning in ESP courses in the vocational higher educational context. This study recommends that more research could be conducted on blended ESP education in more varied majors.