Exploration of the MOOC model in the clinical laboratory English course during the COVID-19 pandemic

This research aims to apply massive open online courses (MOOC) in the teaching of English for Clinical Laboratory and determine the outcomes to ensure 'non-stop teaching and learning' during the COVID-19 pandemic. To achieve the above goals, English for Clinical Laboratory (2003 version) was used for special English teaching in the junior year. The teaching contents were selected and edited on the basis of MOOC guidelines. Sixty-eight junior year students with clinical laboratory major were selected as the participants of the research. Seventy-two medical students taking the conventional online learning mode was set as the control group. The online learning process, quiz scores, discussion participation, answer relevance and scores of the final test were monitored to evaluate the outcomes of the MOOC mode. After a session of 10 weeks, the results showed that the participation, completion, passing rate, relevance and final scores of junior year students undertaking MOOC mode of Special English were optimal. Special English in MOOC mode successfully aroused and kept students' interests and enhanced their learning habits. MOOC may be a practical and efficient teaching method in the pandemic. It has a scientific and sound makeup, defies restrictions in time and space, and provides effective interactions between students and teachers. MOOC is proved to be a desirable method to safeguard the intactness of the English teaching system, and it can be used as a quality teaching measure against the pandemic.