The paper presents the results of a comparative investigation of course
developers’ and teacher trainees’ views regarding the usefulness and effectiveness
of a multimedia self-tuition course designed to introduce foreign language teacher trainees to
tools and methods for organising computer-assisted language learning. The paper first provides
a brief description of the home-study course itself. It describes the course’s main
components, its content as well as the learning and evaluation tasks the course provides in
support of the learning process. Next, the paper reports on the way in which the evaluation
project investigating teacher trainees’ and course developers’ views regarding the
effectiveness of the course was set up. The project’s design is presented, and the way
in which various procedures of data collection (written evaluations and individual interviews)
were triangulated is commented on. In the third section we present the investigation’s main
findings. The section focuses on points of agreement and disagreement between developers’
and trainees’ views regarding the usefulness and effectiveness of the course. Finally,
we describe the changes brought about by the evaluation project, and reflect on the necessity
to take account of future users’ views and requirements in the design and development
process if the training of foreign language teachers is to benefit from web-based delivery.