Reflection on the flexibility of E-tasks

Drawing on your experience at your university, where do the language learning tasks (ideally that involve IT) fall on the flexibility continuum? Give one or more examples to illustrate. Can tasks that are "liberated" or "free" be easily incorporated into your teaching?

Chapter 6 argues that the design and production of digital language learning tasks should not just simply reproduce those that have been done in the textbooks. Those tasks should be closely related to language classroom and be flexible and open enough to get students involved in learning activities.
I agree with the writers on the ideas above. But the key point is not the importance of the flexibility of the tasks, but how to achieve such flexibility in actual task design. Apparently, there is no universal way to meet the needs of students and teachers.
In my university, the online English listening course may be a restricted one on the flexibility continuum. Students are arranged to study intranet- assisted listening in the internet language labs 10 class hours of their English listening courses in one semester and 10 hours in traditional classrooms with one teacher-controlled multimedia computer. Most tasks are just the reproductions of the textbook tasks. Some audio and visual elements appear here and there in the tasks, but mainly for relaxation and enjoyment, such as English songs, video clips.
I don’t think that tasks that are "liberated" or "free" be easily incorporated into your teaching. "Liberated" or "free" means students control their own learning efforts with as fewest teacher involvement as possible. If the tasks are free, how to monitor the feedback of those tasks, especially those poor learners? Are they independent and knowledgeable enough to handle their learning? What are the teachers’ roles in the “free” tasks?