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In this issue: Feature Articles What Do We Know and What Do We Need to Know about Muhammad M. M. Abdel Abdel Latif Latif Arab Gulf EFL/ESL Students’ Writing? – Muhammad Understanding the Impact of Culture on the TESOL Classroom: An Outsider’s Perspective – Marielle Risse Promoting Learner Autonomy in the ESL Classroom Using Web 2.0 – Cindy Gunn Lesson Idea Reader Response Reviews Emerging Technologies Networking TESOL Arabia News Chapter & SIG Reports
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Guidelines for
Contributors General Editorial Policies TESOL Arabia Perspectives is the official publication of TESOL Arabia, designed to meet the organization’s professional objectives by publishing articles that discuss the teaching and learning of English as an additional language at all levels and with a particular focus on the region (the Gulf, Middle East, North Africa and South Asia). TESOL Arabia Perspectives invites previously unpublished manuscripts that address the diverse topics that make up our profession, including, but not limited to, methodology, pedagogy, curriculum and materials development, assessment, classroom inquiry and research, teacher education and language and culture.
Submission Categories & Guidelines Feature Articles Features should generally be between 2000-4000 words in length, and address educational issues (theory leading to practice) relevant to the membership. The articles can document a critical survey of a particular aspect of the field, detail and analyze pedagogical issues, describe and discuss research findings, or highlight contextual factors and their implications for educational practice. All submissions should be thought through, organized, and clearly written. APA style format will be strictly adhered to regarding referencing. Submissions must be in Times New Roman, font size 12, double spaced. Submissions not meeting APA standards will not be reviewed. Every feature article will go through a review process where the reviewers consider how well it: ■ ■
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discusses issues that seek to inform practice; contributes to the knowledge base for teaching and teacher education in general, and in the region in particular; addresses educational issues and needs of ELT in the region; identifies an educational research agenda.
Reviews Reviews should evaluate any recent textbook, resource book, CD/DVD and audio or video title. Reviews should be 500–1000 words in length and evaluate materials for their approach, content, appropriateness, adaptability, and relevancy. A list of materials received
for review will be made available periodically in Perspectives. Please contact Dr Cindy Gunn, the Reviews Editor, at cgunn@aus.edu.
Emerging Technologies This section will document short articles of about 5001000 words that provide overviews of educational technologies, their utilities and incorporation into practice. This could include software, hardware, and web-based resources.
Networking This section will feature conference and country reports. Reports will range between 250-1000 words. Conference reports should provide the readers with a good overview of the conference in question as well as some personal insights of how it impacted the author. Country reports can provide a glimpse of professional activities, concerns and projects in the country. Photos with captions must accompany the submission.
Reader’s Response Reader’s Response gives the readers a forum to respond to articles published in previous issues. Responses should focus on the content of an article and provide reasoned feedback. Responses should be between 500 – 1000 words.
Lesson Ideas Do you have a great lesson idea or an activity that others should know about? Lesson Ideas offers teachers the opportunity to share their activities in context. Submissions should be between 500-1000 words and detail the activity as well as provide a context for usage.
Photographs and other images In order to avoid poor quality images, please submit the largest size and best resolution images you have. This should be at least 300 dpi and saved as a tiff, eps, or jpeg (in order of preference). Headshots and brief bios including the author's current professional affiliation must accompany all submissions.
Send your submissions to: Melanie Gobert TESOL Arabia Perspectives Editor Melanie.gobert@hct.ac.ae
TESOL Arabia Perspectives is published three times a year: November, January and June
Deadline for next issues: September 15, 2011 and November 15, 2011
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C o n t e n t s Perspec tives Volume 18 No. 2 June 2011
From the Editor
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Message from the President
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TESOL Arabia Conference Report
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Feature Articles What Do We Know and What Do We Need to Know about Arab Gulf EFL/ESL Students’ Writing?
Muhammad M. Abdel Latif
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Marielle Risse
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Cindy Gunn
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Jane Hoelker
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Neil McBeath
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John Allan & Stephen Roney
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Teaching Online: Tools and Techniques, Options and Opportunities
Shahla Yassaei
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Business Communication, Business Issues & Business Environment
Ian V. Cull
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Emad A. Jasim
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Colin Toms
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Hassan Hawash
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Understanding the Impact of Culture on the TESOL Classroom: An Outsider’s Perspective Promoting Learner Autonomy in the ESL Classroom Using Web 2.0
Lesson Idea Changing the World One Word at a Time
Reader Response Postscript: Cynical, Cowardly, Ignorant, Libelous, and Unprofessional
Emerging Technologies Simple Audio with Myna
Reviews California Distance Learning Project: Adult Learning Activities World English 1 openMind Student Book & Workbook, Level 2 Calendar of Upcoming Events
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Networking TESOL International Convention and Exhibit Doing Research in Applied Linguistics
Sufian Abu Rmaileh
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Nick Moore
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TESOL Arabia News TESOL Arabia News
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Special Interest Group Reports
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Chapter Reports
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Editor Melanie Gobert Abu Dhabi Men’s College
Copy Editor Dear Colleagues
Rebecca Woll Abu Dhabi Men's College
Welcome to the post-TACON issue of TESOL Arabia Perspectives. We hope this issue finds you well and counting the days until summer vacation.
Reviews Editor Cindy Gunn American University of Sharjah
The first of our three features, “What Do We Know and What Do We Need to Know about Arab Gulf EFL/ESL Students’ Writing?” by Muhammad M. Abdel Latif, funded by a TESOL Arabia Research Grant, is a meta-analysis of 80 research studies done on Gulf Arab students’ writing in ESL and identifies gaps in our knowledge. Our second feature, “Understanding the Impact of Culture on the TESOL Classroom: An Outsider’s Perspective,” by Marielle Risse, offers insights into some of the pitfalls that occur in the classroom between imported ESL/EFL teachers’ and local students’ cultures. Our third feature, “Promoting Learner Autonomy in the ESL Classroom Using Web 2.0,” by Cindy Gunn, presents the enormous potential Web 2.0 offers for exploiting interactive online independent learning.
Advisory Panel Cindy Gunn Daniel Mangrum Fatma Alwan Janet Olearski Kourosh Lachini Lynne Ronesi Muhammad Abdel Latif Nicolas Moore Paul James Dessoir Peter McLaren Saleh S. Al-Busaidi Jane Hoelker Patrick Dougherty Neil McBeath Rachel Lange Abdelhamid Ahmed Dina El Dakhs Joanna Buckle Laura Lau Richard Lau Mick King
We have a lesson idea that is sure to spark our Arabist and vocabulary enthusiasts. “Changing the World One Word at a Time,” by Jane Hoelker, was specifically designed to make our learners feel proud of what their language has contributed to English. Contributor and reader Neil McBeath’s response to the latest attack on his previous article “Cynical, Cowardly, Ignorant, Libelous and Unprofessional” (Perspectives, vol. 18, no.1), proves his point. Our Emerging Technology feature, by John Allan and Stephen Roney, introduces us to the new Web 2.0 tool Aviary and the possibilities of the free audio editing tool, Myna. Inside, we also have our usual Letter from the President, Letter from the Conference Co-Chairs, SIG and Chapter Reports, TA News, and Reviews sections. Finally, it is with some trepidation that I inform you of the departure of my much-loved and appreciated co-editor, Rebecca Woll. She is moving on to greener pastures and a much-anticipated trip around the world. Good luck, Rebecca! Me and all the other readers of Perspectives will miss your keen proof-reading eyes and your graphic taste. The covers have never been more beautiful since you became co-editor!
CREDITS Layout / Artwork Sudeep Kumar
Printing International Printing Press Dubai, UAE
Melanie Gobert Editor, Perspectives
June Cover Photo Rebecca Woll Abu Dhabi Men's College
The editor would like to remind the readers that the views expressed in this periodical are those of the individual authors. These views are not necessarily shared by the other authors in this issue or by TESOL Arabia. Responsibility for the content and opinion of articles and advertisements rests with the authors. TESOL Arabia is a non-profit organisation based in the United Arab Emirates with membership from the Arabian Gulf and beyond. TESOL Arabia does not discriminate against any person on the basis of race, gender, national origin, disability, religion, age, or native language. For more information, please visit our website: http://www.tesolarabia.org
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Message from the President
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Some of you will be aware that this is my second stint as President of TESOL Arabia. Whether I have learned anything as a result of my first spell, only time will tell, but it did occur to me to look at the first “Letter from the President” I wrote in February, 2009. Not, as has been suggested, to copy it and see if anyone notices, but to see what, if anything, has changed in our professional context over the intervening two years. Let me take three of the points I made in 2009 and compare them to this year, 2011: 1. 2009 Membership of teachers’ associations around the world was declining. 2011 Membership of IATEFL, TESOL, and TESOL Arabia has increased. 2. 2009 More institutions in the Gulf were teaching in English. 2011 Even more institutions in the Gulf are teaching in English. 3. 2009 There was increased awareness of the role of “tactical” vs. “strategic” PD. 2011 Leadership training and “strategic” PD has become more prominent. What about the first point in this short list? What can we learn from this for the coming year? In 2009 there was a concern that membership in teachers’ associations around the world seemed to be declining. The suggested reasons for this included the economic squeeze, but also perhaps more importantly, the way that communication between professionals of all types was changing. The proliferation of ever-more-rapid communication, online real-time social networks, online events and many free online facilities for networking seemed to imply that paying for membership of a professional association where many activities involved travelling to faceto-face events was something that younger members of the profession in particular would literally not “buy into.” However, statistics recently released by TESOL in the USA, and by IATEFL in the UK have shown that their memberships have increased, and attendance at their annual conferences has also risen. Not only this, but the virtual attendance at IATEFL and the British Council’s free online facility run parallel to the IATEFL annual conference last year (Harrogate Online) shot up dramatically as well. So, yes, online participation is rising, but not, it seems, at the expense of face-to-face participation. The implication is that teachers do not choose between one or the other, but take advantage of any means they can, and that teachers who have not taken part before, for whatever reason, are now increasingly discovering the advantages of professional networks. As more and more teachers are taking part in professional networks of all sorts, teachers who were previously unable to participate in person are now increasingly able to participate online, and many of these are eventually able to participate in person as well. I’m sure there is traffic the other way too – many of us who previously used to only attend face-to-face events are discovering online ones as well. The immediate lesson for us is to take advantage of this trend. We in TESOL Arabia have long realized we do not reach every teacher, even in our own part of the world.There are teachers out there who have never heard of TESOL Arabia, hard as that is for us to imagine. Let’s look at what we can offer both online and face-to-face, and how we can reach out to more teachers to encourage them to take part in our events of all types. We have already made a start in this direction, as some of our SIGs and the TACON Online initiative have demonstrated, so let’s build on these and link seamlessly to quality face-to-face events, too. Of course, we also offer the opportunity for people to develop their leadership skills by joining the organizers of TESOL Arabia. There is a constant need to attract new ideas and new enthusiasm, so let’s capitalize on all possible means to fulfill this need. In the meantime, I’ll ponder points 2 and 3 and comment on them in further issues of Perspectives if time, space and events permit.
Les Kirkham TESOL Arabia President
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The 17th Annual TESOL Arabia International Conference and Exhibition 2011 was held on March 10-12 at the JW Marriott, Dubai, UAE. Due to the many changes in trends in the field of ELT, the conference theme “Rethinking English Language Teaching: Attitudes, Approaches and Perspectives” reflected this change. About 1445 participants attended the conference with an obvious drop in the number of participants due to the events happening in the region. This year, we were extremely privileged to have His Excellency Sheikh Nahyan Mubarak Al Nahyan, Minister of Higher Education and Scientific Research, open the conference and deliver the keynote address. His Excellency’s speech set the tone of the conference as a place where the “topics and keynote themes recognize what the best teachers have known for a long time, that the teacher must continually adjust one’s aim in order to catch each student at the right moment and with the best strategy to learn.” HE Sheikh Nahyan also emphasized the leadership role of the UAE President, His Highness Sheikh Khalifa Bin Zayed Al Nahyan, in supporting and acknowledging the effort the nation is putting forth to maneuver through a multicultural world.
HE Sheikh Nahyan Mubarak Al Nahyan presents Dr Christine Coombe with the TESOL Arabia Professional Service Award while outgoing President Dr Sufian Abu Rmaileh looks on.
New faces and expertise were brought in this year to help cook up a conference that was one of a kind. Early reviews and evaluations of the conference were very promising. Many commented that it had been the best conference experience they had had in years. TACON 2011 had 6 plenary sessions, 9 featured sessions, 5 Dubai Debates/Discussions, 10 technology-related sessions, 11 SIG sessions, 11 poster sessions as well as 165 concurrent sessions.The plenary speakers were Teresa Pica, John Flowerdew, Peter Grundy, Salah Troudi, Anne Burns and Ali Shehadeh.The plenary sessions offered varied ways of rethinking, from “Rethinking Language Teacher Education: Recent Developments, Current Trends and Future Perspectives” by Ann Burns to “Rethinking Language Awareness” by Peter Grundy and “Rethinking Genre Theory for English Language Teaching” by John Flowerdew.The featured speakers were Barry O’Sullivan, Hayo Reinders, Joan Kang Shin, John Meewella, Terry Phillips, Chuck Sandy, Helen Emery, Winnie Cheng and Neil Anderson. Two new additions were included in the conference. The first was the well-attended Publishing Showcase where two sessions were offered showcasing how to be published both locally and internationally. The other new addition was the TACON 20X20 sessions spearheaded by Rehab Rajab which “Shared Great Ideas in Classroom Teaching in 5 Minutes.” In order for participants to have more time and contact with speaker and experts in the field of ELT, two PreConference Development Courses and two In-Conference Certificate sessions were offered. The two PreConference Development Courses offered were “Action Research in TESOL,” facilitated by Ann Burns and
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Ali Shehadeh, and “Technology in the Classroom,” presented by Abdelbasset Jeddi and Cindy Gunn. The two In-Conference Development Courses were “Increasing Professionalism Through Personal and Professional Development” and “Teacher Effectiveness and Leadership.” These were facilitated by a group of talented experts in the field of teacher effectiveness and professional development.The Pre and In-Conference courses were well-attended, receiving great evaluations from the attendees. Some prizes, such as laptops, printers and PowerPoint laser pointers were given out to lucky participants. In addition to the sessions mentioned above, eight Innovative Materials Showcase sessions were offered for participants to attend. These sessions highlighted ELT products and teaching materials that would assist educators in their respective fields. They also offered the delegates a chance to network and learn from those publishers and material writers. TACON 2011 offered a comprehensive Job Fair which brought together job seekers from around the world and the major recruiting organizations in the region. Looking for qualified candidates to fill many posts with some jobs being offered onsite, the TESOL Arabia Job Fair proved to be the leading employment opportunity for both recruiters and job seekers in the teaching profession. Both recruiters and job seekers found this year’s job fair to be the smoothest run job fair that they had ever attended. TACON 2011 added to the zest of the conference with its highly-visited International Exhibition. Once again the exhibition opened its doors to all book lovers and material writers to help themselves to the latest teaching aids to use in their classrooms. Major publishers and book distributors, many tertiary institutions and other educational organizations from around the world took part in the exhibition. TESOL Arabia Conference Treasurer Beth Wiens accepts the Professional Service Award on behalf of Lucy Dolan, Conference Treasurer from 1999-2008, from outgoing President Dr Sufian Abu Rmaileh.
The conference would not have been a success without our valued sponsors. Once again, they came through for TACON 2011. We are grateful to our Gold Sponsors: AMIDEAST and the British Council; Silver Sponsors: UAE University, Arab Gulf Education,The British University of Dubai, University of Wollongong in Dubai, Emirates College for Advanced Education and IELTS; Bronze Sponsors: Cambridge English and Higher Colleges of Technology; and Friends of TESOL Arabia: Garnet Education and the U.S. Department of State. Finally, sincere appreciation goes to all of those who worked behind the scene to make the conference successful. Without their dedication, hard work and effort, the conference would be lacking. Over 40 volunteers in different capacities worked day and night to make the 17th Annual TESOL Arabia International Conference and Exhibition a success.
Sufian Abu-Rmaileh
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What Do We Know and What Do We Need to Know about Arab Gulf EFL/ESL Students’ Writing? Despite being the least used mode of human communication, writing is of utmost importance as it is the means through which testing and assessment of learning usually takes place. Therefore, it is important to investigate various aspects of Arab Gulf EFL/ESL students’ writing performance. Important also is reviewing the studies conducted on these students’ writing. Such research can inform teachers of how to optimally meet the writing needs of this student population. Critical reviews of writing research related to this context will help identify what we already know and what we need to know about Arab Gulf EFL/ESL students’ writing. Only two review attempts (Abdel Latif, 2008; Al-Hazmi, 2001) were made in relation to this research area. These two attempts are limited in that they paid no particular attention to the diverse areas of research on Arab Gulf EFL/ESL students’ writing, and that is why they did not review many studies related to this context. Therefore, a more comprehensive review work is needed that synthesizes the key findings of previous studies, shows how English writing research has developed in Arab Gulf countries, and highlights the questions answered by this research and the ones left unanswered. The present article tries to address these issues by reviewing research on Arab Gulf EFL/ESL students’ writing.
Method The first step in this review work was to identify all the relevant studies in databases such as Proquest, EBSCOHost, and other publications. This survey process resulted in collecting 80 research reports on the EFL/ESL writing of students belonging to the
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Dr Muhammad M. Abdel Latif Lecturer of ELT, Institute of Educational Studies Cairo University, Egypt
six Arab Gulf countries, Bahrain, the United Arab Emirates (UAE), Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, and Saudi Arabia, which make up the Gulf Cooperation Council, and Yemen, which is culturally close to the member states. Then, the key findings of these 80 reports were synthesized. The results of the review are given below. These results are organized in two sub-sections: a) the context of the studies and EFL/ESL writing research development, and b) the main findings reported.
Arab Gulf Contexts of the Studies and EFL/ESL Writing Research Development Table 1 shows the contexts of the studies reviewed. The studies related to each Arab Gulf context are arranged chronologically. As can be noted, about half of these studies (n= 39) involved Saudi participants. A much fewer number of studies were conducted on the English writing in Emirati (n = 12), Yemeni (n =11), Kuwaiti (n = 7), Omani (n = 5) and Bahraini (n = 4) contexts. Only 2 studies were reported about Qatari students. The table also reflects the quantitative development of the research on Arab Gulf EFL/ESL students’ writing. As the table shows, all the reviewed studies were reported in the last three decades except one. Beck’s (1979) study was the only one found about the target area before the 1980s. Meanwhile, the number of related studies reported has tremendously increased from one decade to another (11, 23 and 45 studies in each of the last three decades, respectively). It can be argued, therefore, that the 1980s witnessed the real
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beginning of EFL/ESL writing research in the Arab Gulf area. Qualitatively speaking, there have been some changes in the focus of studies conducted. While the pre-1990s studies were product-oriented in that they focused mainly on error analysis and on experimenting with some of the product approach techniques in teaching writing, the 1990s studies made use of qualitative methods (e.g., interview, think-aloud and observation protocols). In addition, an increasing number of writing instructional techniques were tested in the studies conducted in the last 15 years. It is worth noting that only 7 of the 80 studies reviewed (Alhosani, 2009; Al-Majed, 1996; El-Shafie, 1991; Emery, 2005; Kharma, 1985; Mohammad, 2008;
Qoqandi, 1985) addressed the writing of pre-university students, while all the other studies dealt with writing in the university context. This may be because of the fact that most ELT researchers in the Gulf area are university teachers who find the university student population much more easily accessible than the preuniversity one. It can also be noted that the vast majority of the 80 studies reviewed were conducted in an EFL writing context rather than an ESL one. Though it cannot be assumed that this is a review of all the studies on Arab Gulf EFL/ESL students’ writing, it reflects the research areas investigated and the quality and quantity of writing studies in each of the seven countries.
Table 1 Arab Gulf Contexts of the EFL/ESL Writing Studies Reviewed
BAHRAIN
UNITED ARAB EMIRATES
KUWAIT
OMAN
Mattar (1990); Qaddumi (1995); Bilton & Sivasubramaniam (2009); Obaid (2009)
Asaad (1985); Taki El Din (1987); El-Shafie (1991); Abdel Fattah (1994); Alreyes (1997); Emery (2005); Hoelker & Hashi (2005); Duthler & Nunn (2008); El Samaty (2008); Glasgow & Fitze (2008); Lewthwaite (2008); Pathare (2008)
Kharma (1981; 1985); Alam (1991); Alharbi (1991); Ameira (1991); Halimah (2001); Mohammad (2008)
Emery (1997); Mahmoud (2002; 2005); Jabur (2009); Monassar (2005)
QATAR
SAUDI ARABIA
YEMEN
Ali (1995); Al-Buainain (2006)
Beck (1979); El-Sayed (1983a); Abdan (1984); Qoqandi (1985); Alhaidari (1992); El-Hibir & Aqel (1992); Abed Al-Haq & Ahmad (1994); Al-Semari (1994); Al-Sindy (1994); Aqel (1994); Aljamhoor (1996; 2001); Al-Majed (1996); Asiri (1996); Jouhari (1997); Al-Amer (2001); Al-Jarf (2002; 2007, 2009); Daoud & Al-Hazmi (2002; 2003); Alnofal (2004); Fageeh (2004); Salebi (2004); Al Fraidan (2005); Al-Qurashi (2005; 2009); Al-Sudies (2005); Grami (2005); AL-Serhani (2007); Shehadeh (2007) Al-Harbi (2009); Al-Hazmi & Scholfield (2007); Alhaysony (2008); Al-Humaidi (2008); Alhosani (2009); McMullen (2009); Alsamadani (2010); Sayed (2010)
El-Sayed (1983b; 1997; 1994); Holes (1984); Shamsher (1994); Al-Fotih (1999); Noman-Yafai (2000); Naef (2003); Al-Zubeiry (2004); Mohammed (2005); Al-Shumairi (2008)
Key Findings of the Studies Reviewed
Types and Causes of Linguistic Errors and Rhetorical Problems
The 80 reviewed studies investigated a variety of EFL/ESL research areas. These can be classified into four categories: a) error and discourse analysis, b) instructional techniques and practices evaluation, c) writing process, and d) writing assessment. Below are the key findings of the reviewed studies briefly synthesized in light of these four research areas.
The reviewed studies revealed some types of linguistic errors made by Arab Gulf students in their English written texts. The grammatical and syntactic errors made by these students include: verbs and verbals, articles, pronouns, nouns, adjectives and prepositions, tenses and tense sequence, copula and auxiliary verbs, relative clauses, fragments and punctuation (Al-Buainain, 2006; Al-Sindy, 1994; El Samaty, 2008; El-Sayed, 1983a). While lexical and
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semantic errors encompass collocations, idioms and word confusion (El Samaty, 2008; Mahmoud, 2005), spelling errors comprise vowel substitution, vowel omission, misordering of vowels and consonant substitution (Emery, 1997). Some studies (Ali, 1995; Beck, 1979) found that spelling errors were the most frequent error type in students’ writing. The linguistic errors found were attributed to overgeneralization, false analogy, the complicated nature of the English grammar system, inadequate teaching (Kharma, 1981), Arabic interference (Al-Fotih, 1999; Al-Sindy, 1994; El-Sayed, 1983a, 1997; Mahmoud, 2005), mode of writing (Qoqandi, 1985), defects in students’ writing skills and the syllabus taught (Mattar, 1990), incomplete application of rules (El-Sayed,1994), and test anxiety (Salebi, 2004). The discourse analysis studies reviewed showed that the most frequent rhetorical problems in Arab Gulf students’ English written texts are argumentativeness (development, support, organization, persuasiveness of the argument, completeness and balance in arguments and counterarguments), thesis (clarity and qualification of the thesis and the direction the thesis provides for the reader) (Abed Al-Haq & Ahmed, 1994), over-reiteration of the same lexical cohesive devices (Shamsher, 1994), repetition, parallelism, sentence length, lack of variation and misuse of certain cohesive devices (Qaddumi, 1995), inappropriate expression of contrastive transitions (Monassar, 2005), and redundancy, verbosity, coordination and subordination (El Samaty, 2008). These rhetorical problems were ascribed to students’ transfer of rhetorical irregularities of the Arabic discourse or rhetorical duality (Halimah, 2001; Holes,1984), lack of exposure to the target language (Ameira, 1991), interference at the linguistic, cultural Muhammad Abdel Latif is a lecturer of and rhetorical levels ELT at the Institute of Educational Studies, Cairo University, Egypt. He is a (Qaddumi, 1995), winner of the 2008 Sheikh Nahayan inadequate grasp of Doctoral Dissertation Fellowship Award, English rhetorical the CMLR 2009 Best Graduate Student Paper Award, and the 2009 ACTFL-MLJ conventions Emma Marie Birkmaier Award for (Halimah, 2001), and Doctoral Dissertation Research in Foreign Language Education. faulty methods of teaching (AlAddress for correspondence: Institute of Educational Studies, Cairo University, Zubeiry, 2004). Giza, Egypt; email:mmmabd@cu.edu.eg
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Effectiveness of Instructional Techniques and Practices Most of the interventional studies reviewed proved the effectiveness of the instructional techniques they tested in enhancing students’ writing. For example, Taki El Din (1987) found that integrating sentence combining practice in an EFL writing course improved UAE students’ overall writing quality and the written syntactic maturity. Similarly, the explicit instruction of English verb tense use provided by Glasgow and Fitze (2008) to UAE students reduced their writing errors with the target verb tense. The results of these two studies suggest that students’ written grammatical accuracy can be fostered through providing grammar instruction prior to independent writing. In addition, the computerbased techniques of teaching writing proposed by Al-Jarf (2002, 2007, 2009), Al-Harbi (2009), and Sayed (2010) helped Arab Gulf students produce better English written texts and provided them with a non-threatening learning environment. The reviewed studies suggest that Arab Gulf students perform better when they receive group feedback (Shehadeh, 2007) and write collaboratively in teams (Duthler & Nunn, 2008). Positive effects were also found for using dialogue journals (Abdel Fattah, 1994), culture-bound reading-writing activities (Alreyes, 1997), counselling-learning approach (Daoud & Al-Hazmi, 2003), portfolio assessment (AL-Serhani, 2007), expressive writing (Bilton & Sivasubramaniam, 2009), process approach (Alhosani, 2009; Jouhari, 1997; Naef, 2003) and writing strategy instruction (McMullen, 2009) on Arab Gulf students’ English writing, and for applying user-friendly activities on developing their spelling accuracy (Pathare, 2008). Additionally, the positive effects Al-Sudies (2005) found for using metacognitive awareness training in developing Saudi EFL writing student-teachers’ skills suggest that real changes occur in writing instruction when teachers change their pedagogical beliefs. As for feedback studies, they showed that direct correction was the most utilised technique for providing feedback, and that surface-level aspects (grammar, vocabulary, and mechanics) were the most incorporated type of feedback while organisation was the least incorporated one (Asiri,
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1996; Daoud & Al-Hazmi, 2002, 2003; Grami, 2005). Unclear suggestions and difficult questions were found to be two main problems hindering Saudi students’ understanding of their teachers’ written feedback (Asiri, 1996). As for students’ most preferred types of feedback, Asiri (1996) reported that direct correction was their most preferred method of feedback. In Al-Hazmi and Scholfield’s (2007) study, neither peer feedback nor using a revision checklist were found to direct Saudi university students’ attention towards essay organisation and content. This led the two authors to surmise that students were not ready to abandon the traditional surface error focus of their classroom. Contrary to the above results, Yemeni students were found to be more responsive to indirect feedback than to direct feedback (Mohammed, 2005), and to instructional comments than to evaluative comments or questioning comments (Al-Shumairi, 2008). Some of the reviewed studies yielded varied results regarding the effect of feedback on English writing classrooms. For example, while Al-Qurashi (2005) found no significant effect for peer feedback on Saudi students’ perceived support in English writing classes, Al-Qurashi’s (2009) subsequent study showed that students had positive perceptions and attitudes towards peer feedback and reported it helped them in improving their texts. It is worth mentioning that the results of the reviewed interventional studies, most of which found positive effects for the experimented instructional technique, should be cautiously interpreted due to the intervening variables involved in experimentation. The results of the very few studies on the evaluation of teaching practices of English writing to Arab Gulf students reflect a dire need for bringing about a change in these practices. For example, Mohammad’s (2008) study indicates that an alternative approach to teaching writing in Kuwaiti first grade classrooms may be more appropriate and more effective in the current curriculum context. Likewise, Obaid (2009) found that the Business English writing program at the University of Bahrain ought to be improved and updated to meet the demands of workplace writing through conducting a systematic needs analysis.
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Writing Process The reviewed studies revealed some aspects of the Arab Gulf EFL/ESL students’ writing processes. The Kuwaiti students who took part in Alam’s (1993) study were found to use Arabic in all writing stages and to make more frequent use of it at the vocabulary level. Similarly, Fageeh (2004) found that his Saudi participants resorted to Arabic to develop their ideas and rehearse their English text. In AlHumaidi’s (2008) study, pre-writing planning helped Saudi students write more text than the within-task planning. As for revising the text, El-Shafie (1991) found that UAE students substituted, added, and deleted far more often than they expanded, reduced, and moved their texts and that their syntactic revisions were more frequent at the word, surface, and phrase levels than at the clause, sentence, and multisentence levels. On the other hand, Saudi students were found to add to their texts more than they deleted when they revised their summaries, and to make grammatical and informational changes more often than mechanical ones (Alhaidari, 1992). AlAmer’s (2001) study showed that students’ surface and meaning revisions differed significantly between word-processed and pen-and-paper English texts. These revision process results seem to be consistent with the ones highlighted above about focusing on surface-level changes in students’ responses to teachers’ written feedback. Results also revealed some difficulties encountered by Gulf students in their EFL/ESL composing processes. These difficulties include: cultural and linguistic problems (Jabur, 2009; Noman-Yafai, 2000), competence in using word processors (AlAmer, 2001), lack of writing strategies and mechanical, vocabulary and grammar knowledge (Aljamhoor, 1996; Fageeh, 2004), and inability to employ writing self-regulation processes effectively (Al-Humaidi, 2008). Some similarities were also revealed between Gulf students’ Arabic and English composing and revising processes (Al-Semari, 1994; Alhaysony, 2008; Alnofal, 2004; Alsamadani, 2010), though Saudi students tended to make more formal, grammatical, mechanical, reorganization and deletion revisions when writing in English than in Arabic (Al-Semari, 1994).
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Assessing Writing The results of the very few studies on writing assessment have uncovered some implications for testing English writing in the Arab Gulf area. For example, the results of Asaad’s (1985) study suggest that using a writing performance test and an analytic scoring procedure provides a high degree of objectivity in evaluating the communicative writing performance of EFL students while a multiple choice test only assesses receptive writing ability and is not recommended for EFL classroom use. Instructors’ cultural-linguistic background was found to be the most influential factor in evaluating EFL students’ writing while their teaching experience correlated positively with the rigidness of their evaluation. In other words, experienced instructors are likely to be more rigid in their evaluation of EFL writing than less experienced ones (Alharbi, 1991). On the other hand, Al Fraidan’s (2005) study revealed non-significant correlations between Saudi university students’ performance on direct (essay, letter and summary writing) and indirect (editing) writing assessment tasks, indicating that writing and editing are different skills, and showed that university instructors and students reported similar frequency of using editing and summarizing in class and in real life. Finally, Lewthwaite (2008) found a strong overlap between what students and staff thought was needed in a writing course and what the IELTS writing tasks require.
Conclusion and Future Research The reviewed studies have answered some questions about Arab Gulf EFL/ESL students’ writing particularly those related to their errors. However, many questions are yet to be answered. Specifically, little or almost nothing is known about the following issues of English writing: ◆ ◆ ◆ ◆ ◆
English writing assessment and teaching practices Description of what is taking place in English writing classrooms at the pre-university stages Pre-university students’ English writing difficulties Graduate students’ academic English writing performance Affective variables related to students’ English writing Volume 18
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Students’ handwriting and computer-based composing processes, and their learning how to write strategies Students’ responses to innovative techniques of teaching writing Arab Gulf scholars’ English publication practices English writing in the workplace Evaluation of the English writing materials and course books used Gender-related individual differences in English writing performance English writing teachers’ pedagogical beliefs and actual practices
Addressing these issues in future research will provide a clearer picture of Arab Gulf EFL/ESL students’ writing needs and how optimally they can be met. Special attention should be given to investigating these issues in the Gulf contexts especially where few research reports are available such as Qatar. The above review shows that some important issues related to Arab Gulf EFL/ESL students’ writing have been addressed in previous research. Writing teachers need to take the key findings synthesized above into consideration when dealing with their students’ needs. These findings can also stimulate future writing researchers to pursue relevant issues. Though the increasing number of studies conducted in the last three decades used a variety of quantitative and qualitative research methods, and dealt with varied issues, there is a need for some new orientations of EFL/ESL writing research in the Arab Gulf countries. Overall, despite the increasing number of studies reported, changes in the research areas investigated and the data collection methods used, EFL/ESL writing research in the Arab Gulf countries is quantitatively and qualitatively still lagging far behind similar research conducted in some parts of the world such as Western Europe, North America and South-East Asia. Accordingly, Arab Gulf EFL/ESL writing researchers need to conduct more studies that make use of a variety of research methods, particularly qualitative ones, and to address neglected research areas.
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Acknowledgements This work was supported by a TESOL Arabia 2010 Research Grant. I would like to thank TESOL Arabia for granting me this award.
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of two Saudi graduate students before and after ESL instruction. Dissertation Abstracts International: Section A, 57(9), 3854. Aljamhoor, A. A. (2001). A cross-cultural analysis of written discourse of Arabic-speaking learners of English. Journal of King Saud University, Language & Translation, 13, 24-44. Alnofal, A. I. (2004). Arabic first language writing and English second language writing processes: A comparative study. Dissertation Abstracts International: Section A, 64(9), 3275. Alreyes, A, (1997). Product and process approaches to the teaching of second language writing: A comparison and synthesis. Dissertation Abstracts International: Section A, 57(12), 5024. Alsamadani, H. A. (2010). The relationship between Saudi EFL students’ writing competence, L1 writing proficiency, and self-regulation. European Journal of Social Sciences, 16(1). Al-Amer, A. S. (2001). The effects of word processing use on textual revision across languages: Arabic as a first language and English as a second language (ESL). Dissertation Abstracts International: Section A, 61(8), 3129. Al-Buainain, H. (2006). Students’ writing in EFL: Towards a teaching methodology. Paper presented at the 2nd International AUC OXF Conference on Language and Linguistics, Cairo, Egypt. Al-Fotih, T. (1999). A study of the errors in the written English of Yemeni Arab freshmen (Unpublished doctoral dissertation). University of Hyderabad, India. Al Fraidan, A. (2005). Direct and indirect assessment of writing with special reference to the Department of Foreign Languages at King Faisal University in Saudi Arabia (Unpublished master’s thesis). University of Essex, UK. Al-Harbi, A. (2009). Comparative study between two ESL writing approaches: Computer processing Microsoft Word vs. hand writing of two freshmen college Saudi student groups. Dissertation Abstracts International: Section A, 69(9). Al-Hazmi, S. (2001). A review of writing product and process research involving Arab EFL/ESL learners. Journal of King Abdul Azia University: Education Science, 14, 87-104. Al-Hazmi, S. & Scholfield, P. (2007). Enforced revision with checklist and peer feedback in EFL writing: The example of Saudi university students.
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Girls' Faculty of Education, Saudi Arabia. Al-Zubeiry, H.Y. (2004). An analysis of deviant language behaviour of Yemeni learners in their written compositions in English (Unpublished doctoral dissertation). University of Hyderabad, India. Ameira, N. (1991). Pragmatic considerations of linguistic and discoursal elements encompassing the ESP students' communicative competence within a framework appropriate to college students' acquisition of competency in writing. Dissertation Abstracts International: Section A, 51(12), 4042. Aqel, F. M. (1994). Grammatical errors made by Saudi university students majoring in English. Journal of Applied Linguistics, 9(l), 3-13. Asaad, S. B. (1985). The construction and validation of a multiple-choice and a performance test of communicative writing ability for the EFL classroom. Dissertation Abstracts International: Section A, 45(9), 2880. Asiri, I. M. (1996). University EFL teachers' written feedback on compositions and students' reactions (Unpublished doctoral dissertation). University of Essex, UK. Beck, R. D. (1979). An error analysis of free composition. Teachers of English: Arab Monthly, 30, 20-26. Bilton, L. & Sivasubramaniam, L. (2009). An inquiry into expressive writing: A classroom-based study. Language Teaching Research, 13(3), 301-320. Daoud, S. & Al-Hazmi, S. (2002). Teaching writing through reflection and thinking. In Z. Syed, C. Coombe, & S. Troudi (Eds.), TESOL Arabia Conference proceedings: Critical thinking and reflection, Vol.VII, 335-359. Daoud, S. & Al-Hazmi, S. (2003). Designing an EFL writing curriculum for Arab students using the tenets of counselling-learning. Journal of King Khaled University, 1(1). Duthler, K. & Nunn, R. (2008). Do team writing projects improve individual writing ability? In C. Coombe, A. Jendli & P. Davidson (Eds.), Teaching writing skills in English: Theory, research and pedagogy (pp.115-126). Dubai, UAE: TESOL Arabia Publications. El-Hibir, I. B. & Aqel, F. M. (1992). An analysis of orthographic errors made by Saudi university students learning English. Language Learning Journal, 5, 85-7.
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El Samaty, M. (2008). More on Arabic interference in English essays. In C. Coombe, A. Jendli & P. Davidson (Eds.), Teaching writing skills in English: Theory, research and pedagogy (pp. 207-226). Dubai, UAE: TESOL Arabia Publications. El-Sayed, M. A. (1983a). An investigation into the syntactic errors of Saudi freshmen's English compositions. Dissertation Abstracts International: Section A, 43(10), 3306. El-Sayed, M. A. (1983b). Errors in the use of articles in Yemeni students’ writing. Language Forum, 9(14), 145-153. El-Sayed, M. A. (1994). Grammatical problems of Arab freshmen students of EFL. Language Forum, 20(1-2), 53-72. El-Sayed, M. A. (1997). Rhetorical problems in the writings of Arab university students. Indian Journal of Applied Linguistics, 23(1), 53-72. El-Shafie, A. S. (1991). English writing development of Arab twelfth-grade students: Case studies of six EFL writers. Dissertation Abstracts International: Section A, 51(11), 3653. Emery, H. (2005). An investigation into the nature and causes of reading and spelling errors made by Arab ESL learners (Uunpublished doctoral dissertation). Cardiff University, UK. Emery, H (1997). Four types of misspelled words: An analysis of Arab spelling vowel substitution, vowel omission, miss-ordering of vowels, and consonant substitution. In S. Troudi & C. Coombes (Eds.), Tradition and innovation: TESOL Arabia Conference Proceedings (pp. 144-154). Abu Dhabi, UAE: TESOL Arabia Publications. Fageeh, A. I. (2004). Saudi college students' beliefs regarding their English writing difficulties. Dissertation Abstracts International: Section A, 64(11), 4035. Glasgow, R. & Fitze, M. (2008). Input enhancement and tense formation in Arab EFL writing. In C. Coombe, A. Jendli & P. Davidson (Eds.), Teaching writing skills in English: Theory, research and pedagogy (pp.193-206). Dubai, UAE: TESOL Arabia Publications. Grami, G. M. (2005). The effect of teachers’ written feedback on ESL students’ perception: A study in a Saudi ESL university-level context. Annual Review of Education, Communication and Language Sciences, 2. Retrieved from http://www.kau.edu.sa/Files/0005407/Researche s/57369_27610.pdf
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Halimah, A. M. (2001). Rhetorical duality and Arabic speaking EST learners. English for Specific Purposes, 20, 111- 139. Hoelker, J. & Hashi, A. (2005). Successful EFL writers from the Gulf. Paper presented at the 18th Annual English Australia Education Conference, Brisbane, Australia. Holes, C. (1984). Textual approximation in the teaching of academic writing to Arab students: A contrastive approach. In J. Swales & H. Mustafa (Eds.), English for Specific Purposes in the Arab World (pp.228-242). Aston, UK: University of Aston. Jabur, Z. M. (2009). A qualitative study of Omani Muslim women's perceived experiences as writers in English as a second language. Dissertation Abstracts International: Section A, 69(11). Jouhari, A. A. (1997). A process approach for teaching English composition at a Saudi university: Six case studies. Dissertation Abstracts International: Section A, 57(7), 2918. Lewthwaite, M. D. (2008). Teacher and student attitudes to IELTS writing tasks: Positive or negative washback? In C. Coombe, A. Jendli & P. Davidson (Eds.), Teaching writing skills in English: Theory, research and pedagogy (pp.175-192). Dubai, UAE: TESOL Arabia Publications. Kharma, N. (1981). The analysis of errors committed by Arab university students in the use of the definite and indefinite articles. International Review of Applied Linguistics, 19, 333-354. Kharma, N. (1985). Arab students and the English relative clause. Arab Journal for the Humanities, Kuwait University, 19(5), 328-341. Mahmoud, A. (2002). Interlingual transfer of idioms by Arab learners of English. The Internet TESL Journal, 8(2). Retrieved from http://iteslj.org/Articles/Mahmoud-Idioms.html Mahmoud, A. (2005). Collocation errors made by Arab learners of English. Asian EFL Journal, Teachers Articles, 5(2). Retrieved from http://www.asian-efljournal.com/pta_August_05_ma.php Mattar, H. E. (1990). Cross-sectional error analysis study of the common writing errors made by adult Arabic-speaking EFL learners in Bahrain. Dissertation Abstracts International: Section A, 50(10), 3171. McMullen, M. G. (2009). Using language learning strategies to improve the writing skills of Saudi EFL
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problems in the writings of Arab students at the University of Bahrain: Sources and solutions (Unpublished doctoral dissertation). University of Nottingham, UK. Qoqandi, A. M. (1985). Measuring the level of syntactical growth of Saudi twelfth graders in EFL writing using t-unit analysis. Dissertation Abstracts International: Section A, 46(4), 916. Salebi, M.Y. (2004). Saudi college students' perception of their errors in written English. Scientific Journal of King Faisal University, Humanities and Management Sciences, 5(2), 209-228. Sayed, O. H. (2010). Developing business management students' persuasive writing through blog-based peer-feedback. English Language Teaching, 3(3), 54-66. Shamsher, M. A. (1994). Problems of cohesion and coherence in the writing of non-native advanced learners of English: The case of 4th year English specialists, College of Education, Sana'a University, the Republic of Yemen (Unpublished doctoral dissertation). University of Strathclyde, UK. Shehadeh, A. (2007). The effect of group and individual peer feedback on student writing in an EFL Gulf context. In C. Coombe & L. Barlow (Eds.), Language teacher research in the Middle East, (pp. 147-160). USA: TESOL International. Taki El Din, S. R. (1987). The effectiveness of sentence combining practice on Arab students' overall writing quality and syntactic maturity. Dissertation Abstracts International: Section A, 47(8), 3022. ❉
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TESOL Arabia Book Drive Back in Action! If you or your institution has books they want to donate, please contact Ruth Glasgow at tesolbookdrive@yahoo.com. Website: www.tesolarabia.org
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Understanding the Impact of Culture on the TESOL Classroom: An Outsider’s Perspective It is important that TESOL teachers in Arabia are aware of possible cultural miscommunications. Hall states, a “full understanding of what happens inside a classroom must... be based on an understanding of the sociopolitical forces with which students must contend outside the school” (2002, p. 87). As students’ behavior in class is influenced by the students’ cultural background, it is vital to make both students’ and teachers’ cultural expectations clear in order to decrease the chance of misunderstandings (Hung, 2009, p. 68). To help facilitate cross-cultural understanding, it is important to explicitly define aspects of a culture which affect behavior in educational situations. Only then can one suggest how teachers can teach effectively within the cultural framework. Business paradigms are well-aware that understanding the cultural milieu is vital for success. For example “Understanding the Role of Culture” is the third chapter in International Management: Managing Across Borders and Cultures (2007). Deresky writes “a critical skill for managing people and process in other countries is cultural savvy...a working knowledge of the cultural variables affecting managerial decisions” (p. 90). This savvy is also needed in the classroom as Scollon and Scollon (2001) explain in Intercultural Communication. They make the point that teachers need to be aware that some Asian students, “find it difficult, at least at first, to deal with the inherent difference between their cultural expectations of a hierarchical system and the commutative classroom expectations of symmetrical solidarity” (p. 215).
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Dr Marielle Risse Director of the Center for Teaching and Learning Dhofar University Salalah, Oman
Al Harthi (2005) also illustrates the importance of understanding cultural differences in the classroom in her article “Distance Higher Education Experiences of Arab Gulf Students in the United States: A Cultural Perspective.” She explains how basic differences between Western and non-Western world views can impact student learning such as the importance in Arab cultures of avoiding direct confrontation and not appearing too eager in the classroom (p. 9). The purpose in explicating culture is not to encourage teachers to molly-coddle students, but for TESOL teachers to understand that student behavior is, in a large part, a manifestation of culture. This understanding helps avoid unexpected and unnecessary conflict. Below are a few examples compiled by teachers, staff and students at Dhofar University (DU) that may be of assistance to other teachers in understanding their students’ behavior.
Example 1: Before Teaching Aspect of Culture In Omani culture, friendship and working together is very important.
How this is manifested in students During the advising period, students will often ask that they be put in the same class as their friends or relatives. In class, students will often sit in the same seat, next to the same person every day.
How a teacher can react When registering students: ◆ Advisors should try to get friends/relatives in the same class if it is possible.
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If it is not possible for friends to take every class together, advisors need to explain the situation clearly and give the students a choice (e.g., “The 1 p.m. class is full, but you can both take it at 8 a.m.”).
In the classroom: ◆ Teachers cannot allow students to switch sections/show up in other sections to be with friends/relatives. ◆ If students talk or act out in class, teachers should separate students from their friends/relatives. That friends sit together in a class might seem normal or expected to teachers from certain cultures, but some cultures encourage students to be competitive in college classrooms or have students sit in assigned seats by alphabetical order or some other classifications because the idea of taking the exact same university schedule as a friend, sibling or cousin is very unusual. For example, students might choose classes depending on the time, their major or their interests. In the Middle East, however, sometimes a family will hold a cousin or a sibling back for one year so that two relatives can be at university at the same time. Sometimes relatives or friends who live near each other will want classes at the same time to make car-pooling easier. This information is also vital for new teachers who are planning first day activities. For example, group work in the first days of class will not work as well as pair work, as students will probably have one or two friends in the class. Pair work will feel comfortable and familiar, whereas group work will throw students into new relationships. This is especially important for beginning learners who may feel shy or uncertain speaking in front of the class.
Example 2: Cultural Understanding of Good Behavior A) Aspect of Culture It is expected in Omani culture that people will hold their temper, control themselves in public and not get upset over unimportant issues.
How this is manifested in students Students will be genuinely bewildered if a teacher
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becomes angry over issues such as a student coming late, attending class without materials, or asking the same questions repeatedly.
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Teachers need to keep their temper, repeating calmly what the rules of the class are and how the students need to behave. If students ask the same questions repeatedly, ask other students, “What is the answer?”
B) Aspect of Culture In Omani culture, it is not polite or normal to make negative comments in public.
How this is manifested in students If a teacher says “You are bad students,” students will take that to heart, making the classroom more confrontational than it has to be.
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Teachers should never make general statements such as “This is the worst class I have ever seen.” If a student or class is disruptive, teachers should comment on the behavior and explain the problem: “I don’t like it when you come late because it disrupts the class.”
In some cultures it is expected that teachers will raise their voices at students, refuse to answer questions or speak brusquely. In some cultures “negative motivation” is normal in college classrooms. This behavior is not conventional in Oman. Teachers need to be aware that this kind of behavior may result in classroom management problems as students will react to perceived inappropriate anger. It does not matter if a teacher has the best lesson plan, if the class feels insulted or backed into a corner, learning will not happen.
Example 3: Cultural Understanding of the Concept of Fairness A) Aspect of Culture Omani culture believes that fairness (treating all people equally and with respect) is very important.
How this is manifested in students If a teacher, for example, allows one student to come into the class late, all the students will note this and remember it. On another day, if a student
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comes late and the teacher does not allow him/her in the class, the students will either remind the teacher or make a note that the teacher is not fair.
How a teacher can react ◆ ◆
Teachers should try to keep consistent polices for all students. If a teacher needs to make an exception, explain this briefly to the class (e.g., simply say “I am letting X come in late because…”).
will refuse to stand up to go to the board, or will not want to engage in class discussions. In addition, it is often impossible to know if students are confused because: a) students will often attempt to cover their confusion, and b) students’ non-verbal signals may be difficult for non-Omanis to understand.
How a teacher can react ◆
B) Aspect of Culture It is expected in Omani culture that a person with a grievance has the right to say his or her problem to the person in control who will listen before making a final decision. ◆
How this is manifested in students Students expect that you will hear their complaints.
How a teacher can react ◆
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Teachers need to understand that they may need to explain the same policy many times, sometimes even to the same students. Teachers should write down all expectations for student behavior and review this document with students. Teachers need to set and keep office hours. If a student tries to start a debate about a given policy, ask the student to come to your office.
In some cultures a teacher’s word is law. Students are expected to silently accept and agree with the teachers’ judgments; teachers do not feel that they need to explain their decisions to the class. However, in Oman, students will note and discuss any unfairness, even to the point of bringing up an incident that happened weeks or months previously. This does not mean the students control the class, but that teachers must be explicit about their actions.
Example 4: Cultural Understanding of Student Behavior Aspect of Culture The Omani culture encourages people to be reserved, to not speak up or show emotions in public, especially young women. Students will often feel too shy to speak in class,
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Some countries encourage college students to express their ideas in class, to challenge the teacher, to demand further explanations if they are confused and to express their opinions. However, “I can’t tell what they are thinking” is a common refrain from
How this is manifested in students
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Address this issue directly. Teachers should tell students, “I need to know when you are confused so that I can go over the point again, but I can’t tell from your faces if you understand or not. Can you please shake your head/raise your hand/call out to let me know what you are thinking?” At the start of the semester, if there are older than average students in the class, use them to translate for a week or two. An older student can sometimes be afraid to say if s/he is confused, but if a teacher asks “I can’t tell if the students are getting this. Is the class ready to move on to the next topic?” the older student can judge the other students and speak for them without losing face. As the students get used to this kind of general question, students will start to respond on their own. If a teacher encounters a sea of perfectly blank faces, ask direct questions to check for comprehension, such as “What are the three main stages of childhood?” Teachers need to slowly introduce activities such as writing on the board or speaking in front of the class. For example, create small groups and have each student speak in front of their group at least once before attempting presentations in front of the class. Teachers should be aware that, even if they have previous Middle Eastern experience, they may not be able to accurately read a classroom for the first few months and should pay extra attention to the very discrete signals that students are giving them.
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teachers who are new to Oman. At Dhofar University, it is unusual to have a rowdy class; students are typically quiet. Omani students will sometimes declare that they comprehend something that is, in fact, not clear to them because they are too shy to admit confusion in public. This cultural aspect has two important impacts on teaching decisions. First, new teachers cannot expect that students will be willing to write on the board or speak in front of the class during the first week of classes. Teachers will need to check the class temperament and slowly transition students into performing in front of others. Second, new teachers cannot depend on asking “Any questions?” “Is this clear to you?” or “Are you ready for the second point?” At the beginning of the semester, new teachers will need to do specific comprehension checks for understanding.
Example 5: Cultural Understanding of Group Work Aspect of Culture The Omani culture is tribal-oriented, which means that each member is obligated to help another tribe member in trouble. This is expanded to the general belief that if a person is specifically asked for support, he or she is obligated to assist. At the same time, it is rude to point out if a person fails to help. Thus, people who shirk group responsibilities are not called out.
How this is manifested in students Students are happy to work in pairs and groups but if one member refuses to work, the other students will simply do that group member’s work for him/her. This can lead to resentment and anger over grading issues.
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For a shorter assignment, teachers can have students choose their own pairs and have students start the work in class so they can check to see that everyone is working. For a longer assignment, teachers can give students a list of what steps they will have to take to do the project and then have students report which student will do which step. For a longer assignment, teachers can have one or two meetings with students Volume 18
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individually to check progress. If a teacher asks a group “How are you doing?” the answer will be “Fine,” even if there is a serious problem because it is not polite to discuss problems in public. A teacher can usually only find out that there is a problem within the group if the teacher talks to each student alone. At the end of the project, teachers should ask groups to create task sheets in which students have to explain what tasks each student did. This sheet must be signed by all students.
In some cultures, students will police each other in groups to make sure the work is divided equally. If there is a student who is not working, the other students will discuss the issue with the teacher. In Oman, to tattle on another student is shameful behavior; that is, Omani students will usually not make it clear if a student has not done any work on a group project. The problem becomes clear only on the day the assignment is due or when the teacher assigns grades. New teachers who are used to self-regulating groups will need to build additional structure into group assignments. Teachers should also check on the students periodically to make sure the group work is evenly distributed.
Example 6: Cultural Understanding of Family Aspect of Culture In Omani culture, the family/tribe have the absolute priority at all times.
How this is manifested in students Students will sometimes come to class unprepared because of family obligations (weddings, funerals, Eid celebrations, taking family members to the hospital or visiting family members in the hospital, etc.) For example, when it rains in the mountains, students may need to go help family members with livestock.
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Teachers will have to have a policy about accepting late work and make that policy clear to the class. It is impossible to determine if a student was simply sleeping in or if his/her mother was sick. Teachers should not get into verification
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discussions. If a teacher is told about a family emergency, say, “I am sorry; you still need to do your homework.” If it is a serious problem (death of a parent, serious illness) the student’s friends will come and tell the teacher (see above point about the importance of friends) or the university administration will inform the teacher. Teachers need to understand that even if a student wants to do the class work, the student is never in control of his/her time. If, for example, a relative stops by the house, the student may be obliged to stop doing school work to entertain the relative. Teachers can explain to students the importance of school work and can create policies to help students, but even the best students will occasionally say “Sorry, teacher, I missed class because my family needed me.” Teachers should avoid “school work is more important than family” discussions; the framework should be about managing time or making priorities.
Teachers who come from cultures in which college students live alone and are responsible for their time can have trouble adjusting to Omani culture. Similarly, teachers from cultures in which college students live at home and are protected (i.e., college studies are seen as more important than family obligations) are confused by the privileging of family over school work. New teachers from nonArabian cultures need to understand that directly attempting to impose their own cultural values (i.e., studying is more important than family) will only result in misunderstandings and anger. Teachers should never deliberately set up family vs. class work dichotomies. New teachers need to understand that trying to figure out if a student’s parent is really in the hospital is a waste of time. Similarly, conversations Dr Risse’s research focus is connecting Middle Eastern and Western writers in literature classrooms such as, “Why and intercultural communication/competence. She do you have to is a fellow of the Royal Geographical Society. She help your sister has presented at TESOL Arabia, the American University of Sharjah, Sultan Qaboos University, as with her well as for the Modern Language Association, wedding? How Humanities Education and Research Association, many sisters to and College English Association. do you have?
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Why don’t the other sisters help your sister? Your project is more important!” are insulting to students. Dedicated students are aware of the necessity of meeting both family and university obligations; they need the teacher’s encouragement and helpful suggestions to develop useful time management strategies. Students who are less interested in studying will see teacher attempts to explain that homework is more important than family obligations as ridiculous. Teachers should not simply accept “I had to help my family” excuses without comment, but should be realistic and set policies for late assignments, then enforce them. In conclusion, TESOL programs should be encouraged to collectively write up lists similar to the above aspects of culture and discuss them with teachers and students. If the information is presented in a verbal format, such as a workshop at the beginning of the semester, the first two items in the lists presented above, “Aspect of Culture” and “How this is manifested in students” can be written down and then the presenter can lead a group discussion to help teachers brainstorm ideas. A classroom in which students and the teacher understand and respect each other’s cultural differences is a classroom where learning can take place without unnecessary interference.
References Al Harthi, A. S. (2005). Distance higher education experiences of Arab Gulf students in the United States: A cultural perspective. International Review of Research in Open and Distance Learning, 6(3), 1-14. Deresky, H. (2007). International management: Managing across borders and cultures. New York, NY: Prentice Hall. Hall, J. K. (2002). Teaching and researching language and culture. Essex, UK: Pearson Education. Hung, Y. (2009). Reader response and ethnicity: A difference that makes a difference. The English International Language Journal, 4, 66-91. Scollon, R. & Scollon, S.W. (2001). Intercultural communication: A discourse approach (2nd ed.). Oxford, UK: Blackwell Publishing. ❉
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Promoting Learner Autonomy in the ESL Classroom Using Web 2.0 The goal of learner autonomy, as worthwhile as it is to many teachers and learners, is not one that is easily reached. ESL students bring with them their rich cultural backgrounds and expectations of learning, which may not include becoming an autonomous learner. If this is the case, a teacher need not give up on the notion of fostering learner autonomy, but rather work at designing tasks that will provide the life-long learning skills students need to become autonomous. Little (2008) believes that “our capacity for autonomous behavior in any sphere develops not in isolation, but in interaction with others. Thus … growth of learner autonomy is stimulated above all by interaction” (p. 256). Interaction in the classroom can be achieved through group work, pair work, and large class discussion. Outside the classroom, modern technologies have opened up many interactive options for the autonomous learner to continue his/her quest for knowledge. Carefully chosen Web 2.0 activities that utilize technology effectively is one alternative open to teachers who wish to promote learner autonomy in the ESL classroom.
Defining Autonomy In 1991, Little described autonomy as the "buzzword" of the 1990s (p. 2). Buzz-word or not, according to Benson (2006) in the new millennium, “interest in autonomy has grown considerably … In terms of sheer quantity, the literature on autonomy published since 2000 exceeds the literature published over the previous 25 years” (p. 21). Many definitions of learner autonomy have appeared since Holec’s much cited quote which states that autonomy is “the ability to take charge of one’s own learning” (1981, p. 3). Other definitions of autonomy include the concept of the learner’s capacity for autonomy both behavioral and Volume 18
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psychological (Benson, 2007; Little, 2008; Mynard, 2006). The lack of an agreed upon definition of autonomy is somewhat problematic as Benson (2007) notes, “if we are to foster autonomy, we need to know what it is we are trying to foster” (p. 736).
The Teacher’s Role in Promoting Learner Autonomy Regardless of the lack of a set definition, many researchers believe that the teacher has an important role in helping students become autonomous. Austin (2006), for example, notes that the “responsibility for autonomous learning sits not only with the learner, but also with the teacher” (para. 10). Voller supports the importance of the teacher’s role but also points out, "there is a paradox about the teacher’s role in independent language learning; the truly autonomous learner would not need a teacher at all” (1997, p. 107). This point may be true, but in my experience, very few students have reached the stage of being in charge of their learning. Like many others, I believe it is part of my role as a teacher to design activities and structure my classes in a way that will help the students become autonomous. As Alotaibi (2010) notes after introducing CALL activities into her classes, “the finding of this study showed that in order to foster our learners’ autonomy, teachers need to encourage students…to work collaboratively” (p. 17). Littlewood (1997) suggests that, in addition to the teacher’s commitment to helping students develop autonomy, the student’s willingness and ability to act independently are important considerations in classrooms devoted to promoting learner autonomy. Students’ willingness or lack of willingness can be related back to their cultural beliefs. Pennycook points out that "the concept of autonomy is central
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to western liberal thought" (1997, p. 36) which may or may not be valued by other cultures. We must look at the cultural and political side of this issue. Pennycook suggests that, “promoting autonomy in language learning, therefore, needs to take into account the cultural contexts of the language learners, to open up spaces for those learners to deal differently with the world, to become authors of their own worlds” (1997, p. 53). In addition, we need to “seek to equip learners with knowledge and skills they can deploy spontaneously in their life beyond the classroom” (Little, 2008, p. 247). How successful students will be in this regard is influenced by “the complex interaction of inherited traits with domestic, social and cultural factors” (Little, 2008, p. 247). As Gao (2010) notes, “autonomous language learners sustain their learning with strong motivation, beliefs in what works in learning and strategies that help achieve their language learning objectives, all considered essential components of autonomous language learning” (p. 581). In research into autonomy and technology, Toyoda (2001) found that there are “three conditions necessary for autonomous learning: 1) accessible and reliable technology, 2) sufficient computer literacy in students, and 3) good communication with and support from peers” (para. 1). Mynard (2006) adds another consideration for the successful integration of technology and that is the importance of task design. Alm (2006) agrees and states that “in some instances, it might be necessary to explain the rationale of the task, its use, importance and value” (p. 33). Mynard (2006) found that students in the United Arab Emirates responded positively to the incorporation of CMC (Computer-Mediated Communication) activities and that students demonstrated a capacity for autonomous learning in chat room tasks (p. 14). Healey (2002) observes that “technology provides a wealth Cindy Gunn is an Associate Professor in the Department of English and Director of resources and of the Faculty Development Center at potential, but is the American University of Sharjah not a solution on (AUS). Her main research interests are reflective teaching and learning, its own” (p. 4). materials development and effective Thus, the use of technology in education. She importance of can be contacted at cgunn@aus.edu. the teacher’s role
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is once again emphasized.
What is Web 2.0? Web 2.0 is a term popularized by O’Reilly in 2004 to describe changes in functions and features of the Web. As Karpati (2009) points out, “the most important feature of Web 2.0 for language education is the change of direction in communication on the internet” (p. 140). Web 1.0 is referred to as the “readable web” while Web 2.0 is known as the “writable web.” Web 2.0 offers students the opportunity to move beyond being a consumer of authentic materials, as was the case in Web 1.0, to being an active contributor and creator of material on the web without extensive programming skills. Thus, in this way, students are not simply going to various websites and looking up information or playing a language learning game. There is the expectation that the incorporation of Web 2.0 into the class will enhance students’ opportunities for interaction and collaboration to promote learner autonomy. Examples of Web 2.0 tools are blogs, photo and video sharing, social networking, wikis, and so on. These tools offer either, or both, synchronous, real-time communication, and asynchronous, delayed communication, modes of interaction.
Utilizing Web 2.0 to Promote Autonomy Although there are many opportunities for interaction on the internet, it is the teacher’s responsibility to help the students choose the most appropriate activities and websites to meet their learning goals. Karpati (2009) suggests that “teachers have to act as insightful mentors during the initiation process to this new, collaborative … type of meaning making” (pp. 144 – 145). In addition, as Alm (2006), points out regarding Web 2.0: there is no lack of interesting and relevant materials, but it might still be a challenge for the teacher to structure the task in such a way that the chosen material leads to information sharing for interaction. It is the careful balance between structure and choice that allows learners to become autonomous. (pp. 33 – 34) Two major services that encourage interaction are wikis and blogs. Godwin-Jones (2003) notes that
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while “blogs can be highly personal, wikis are intensely collaborative” (p. 15). With both wikis and blogs, students receive feedback from others and in the case of blogs, the students decide how much input they will give and how often they will participate. Wikis allow students to work collaboratively on a project giving students the option to add to the wiki and edit each other’s work. As West (2009) notes, wikis are especially suited “for collaborative activities, especially those that are dynamic and nonlinear in construction and will result in a shared product or outcome” (p. 6). The types of collaborative projects could be writing a report/research paper, creating a class dictionary or, as suggested by Erben, Ban and Castaneda (2008), developing a grammar wiki. Wikis, if they are a class project, are structured but still have the element of choice important to fostering learner autonomy. Godwin-Jones (2006) notes that blogs are one of the most popular and widely used Web 2.0 tools and describes them in terms of helping to “create a more student-centered learning environment… particularly if students create blogs that they control and whose content they own” (p. 11). Blogs allow the readers of the blog to post comments and interact with the owner of the blog and most have a feature to control who has access to the blog. Sheetz and Curcher (2010) found in their informal study with male Emiratis at the Higher Colleges of Technology in the United Arab Emirates (UAE) that 70% of the students reported that they found the reflective writing blog activity useful. In addition, 70% said they would blog again. Although blogs are the responsibility of the blog owner and can be very personal, as Karpati (2009) points out, “blogs are commented upon and eventually develop into discussion lists” (p. 144). The positive view of blogging, the choices blogs open to the students and the personal, often reflective, nature of blogs help lead to autonomy. There are many other services that also allow for interaction between the students and other members of the Web community. As Richardson (2006) notes, Web 2.0 services allow students to “construct, develop, sustain, and participate in global networks that render time and place less and less relevant” (p. 8). Social networking sites such as
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Facebook and MySpace allow users to interact with others by making public announcements, sending and receiving private messages, and many other communicative features. Karpati (2009) points out that “these collaborative activities make Web 2.0 the paradigm of a knowledge building community, - the ideal teacher-learner [learner-learner] interaction proposed by contemporary educational theory” (p. 144). There are, however, some aspects of using Web 2.0 with students that need to be taken into account. The services are generally free, but the “freedom” sometimes comes at a cost regarding advertising. Not all the ads that are randomly displayed are appropriate and may be offensive to students. In addition, anyone, anywhere, can put up a website and this can invite unwanted contact. Since Web 2.0 services “are not by design ‘controlled’” (Oradini & Saunders, 2008, p. 1), comments may or may not be viewed and vetted before they are posted and may contain offensive or inappropriate language. Kayser (2002) found that when she investigated the use of technology in the UAE that the use of the Internet with its open nature “can unintentionally expose students to culturally inappropriate material” (p. 57). These issues are important for a teacher to be aware of and to work around, thus once again reinforcing the important role a teacher has in the development of learner autonomy. Another issue discussed by Al-Soraihi (2010) concerns the use of real-time chatting in classes. Real-time chatting is synchronous communication, that is, all participants are online at the same time and there is limited to no time lag between posts. In addition to the problem some of the students in Saudi Arabia found in keeping up with the conversations because of limited keyboarding skills, the researcher also noted that for the students “real-time chatting [was] very confusing and frustrating when there [were] more than three people communicating” (p. 207). Realtime chatting can also result in students being exposed to inappropriate language.
Conclusion Web 2.0’s interactive nature makes it one more avenue for students to follow on their language learning journey. Like any carefully planned activity, the teacher is actively involved in choosing and assigning the most appropriate Web 2.0 tool for TESOL Arabia Perspectives
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his/her students to help them reach their language learning goals and to promote learner autonomy.
References Alotaibi, H. (2010). CALL for change. Perspectives, 17(2), 7 – 14. Al-Soraihi, M. (2010). Educational web tools & technologies for teachers. In M. Al-Hamly, P. Davidson & I. Fayed (Eds.) Computers in English language teaching (pp. 202 – 212). Dubai, UAE: TESOL Arabia Publications. Alm, A. (2006). CALL for autonomy, competence and relatedness: Motivating language learning environments in Web 2.0. The JALT CALL Journal, 2(3), 29 – 38. Austin, S. (2006). Encouraging learning autonomy in ESL. 19th Annual EA Education Conference 2006. Retrieved from http://www.englishaustralia.com.au/index.cgi?E =hcatfuncs&PT=sl&X=getdoc&Lev1=pub_c07_ 07&Lev2=c06_austi Benson, P. (2006). Autonomy in language teaching and learning. Language Teaching, 40, 21-40. doi:10.1017/S0261444806003958 Benson, P. (2007). Autonomy and its role in learning. In Springer international handbook of English language teaching,15(1), 733-745. doi: 1.1—71978-0-387-46301-8_48 Erben, T., Ban, R., & Castaneda, M. (2008). Teaching English language learners through technology. New York: Routledge. Gao, X. (2010). Autonomous language learning against all odds. System, 38, 580-590. doi: 10.1016/j.systme.2010.09.011 Godwin-Jones, R. (2003). Blogs and wikis: Environments for on-line collaboration. Language Learning & Technology, 7(2), 12-16. Godwin-Jones, R. (2006). Tag clouds in the blogosphere. Language Learning & Technology, 10(2), 8-15. Healey, D. (2002). Learner autonomy with technology: What do language learners need to be successful? Retrieved from pages.uoregon.edu/dhealey/tesol2002/autonomy pres-withbiblio.doc Holec, H. (1981). Autonomy in foreign language learning (first published in 1979, Strasbourg: Council of Europe). Oxford: Pergamon. Kayser, A. (2002). Cultural appropriateness of networked-based language teaching in a Middle Volume 18
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Eastern female Islamic context. Computer Assisted Language Learning, 15(1), 55-67. Karpati, A. (2009). Web 2 technologies for net native language learners: A “social CALL.” ReCALL, 21(1), 139 – 156. Little, D. (1991). Learner autonomy 1: Definitions, issues and problems. Dublin: Authentik. Little, D. (2008). Knowledge about language and learner autonomy. In J. Cenoz & H.H. Hornberger (Eds.) Encyclopedia of language and education (2nd Ed.), Volume 6: Knowledge about Language, 247-258. Littlewood, W. (1997). Self-access: Why do we want it and what can it do? In P. Benson & P. Voller (Eds.) Autonomy and independence in language learning (pp. 79-91). London: Longman. Mynard, J. (2006). A teacher’s role in using synchronous computer-mediated communication to promote learner autonomy. The Language Teacher, 30(2), 13-16. Oradini, F., & Saunders, G. (2008). The use of social networking by students and staff in higher education. Paper presented at the iLearning Forum, 2008, Paris, France. Pennycook, A. (1997). Cultural alternatives and autonomy. In P. Benson & P. Voller (Eds.) Autonomy and independence in language learning (pp. 35-53). London: Longman. Richardson, W. (2006). Blogs, wikis, podcasts, and other powerful web tools for classrooms (2nd ed.). Los Angeles: Corwin Press. Sheetz, D., & Curcher, M. (2010). Using blogs to enhance content learning for students who are learning in a second language. In M. Al-Hamly, P. Davidson & I. Fayed (Eds.) Computers in English language teaching (pp. 187-201). Dubai: TESOL Arabia Publications. Toyoda, E. (2001). Exercise of learner autonomy in project-orientated CALL. CALL-EJ Online, 2(2). Retrieved from http://www.tell.is.ritsumei.ac.jp/callejonline/jou rnal/2-2/toyoda.html Voller, P. (1997). Does the teacher have a role in autonomous language learning? In P. Benson & P. Voller (Eds.) Autonomy and independence in language learning (pp.98-113). London: Longman. West, J.A. (2009). Using wikis for online collaboration: The power of the read-write web. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.
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Changing the World One Word at a Time Looking for a way to motivate your students to improve their spelling in English? Why not create some activities with words that English has borrowed from Arabic? Students enjoy learning about the words their L1 has lent to English. A website, maintained by Merriam Webster, at http://myspellit.com/ offers a menu of words used in the Scripps Spelling Bee, borrowed by English from many other languages, including Arabic. To create a positive atmosphere in the class about spelling accuracy, we view and discuss the highly popular film, Akeelah and the Bee. While exploring the film website (www.akeelahandthebee.com), my students and I discovered the link to the website for the Scripps National Spelling Bee Championship held annually in late spring in Washington, D.C. which in turn has a link to the “myspellit” site. I decided to create some activities with the words derived from the Arabic so that my students could practice these words and become more motivated to learn English through the pride they take in their L1. Indeed, the importance of motivation and learning experiences that are meaningful and relevant (i.e. of emotions in the language learning process) and their impact on learner self-esteem is increasingly emphasized in the growing body of research on the neurobiological base of learning (Arnold, 1999).
The Seven Categories First, I alphabetized the 51 Study Words found at the “myspellit” website in one list and the 31 Challenge Words in a second list. I eliminated one word, alcohol, from the list out of respect to the religious sensibilities of the students. A simple click on each word links to the meaning on the Merriam Webster Dictionary online at www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary. As I analyzed the vocabulary list, I found that the words grouped themselves into seven categories:
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Jane Hoelker Qatar University Doha, Qatar
food or eating; religion; color; animals; farming; power, leadership, government, or the military; and math or science. Of the 51 Study Words, the seven colors are adjectives with three used also as nouns (lemon, orange, and saffron); the rest of the words are nouns. Of the 31 Challenge Words, only one is an adjective, halal. The remainder of the words are nouns. The seven categories reflect the areas of daily life on which the Arabic culture had the most influence or to which it made the most contribution when it spread throughout the world from the seventh to the fifteenth centuries. I explored two vocabulary textbooks in my home library, Volume 3 and 6 of the series, Words for Students of English: A Vocabulary Series for ESL (Rogerson, Hershelman, Jasnow & Moltz, 1992). I discovered that six of these categories are listed as chapter themes in the table of contents of Volume 3, Intermediate Level, (Food, Religion, Farming, Government, Military, and Science) and repeated in Volume 6, Advanced Level, with the topic of Religion included under the heading, Morality. It seems that these themes are often treated in textbooks. Therefore, these exercises could supplement the appropriate chapter in a reading, listening or writing textbook. I decided to present the vocabulary in categories whenever possible because it is easier for learners to master vocabulary that is grouped together based on a theme. After using the activities with several classes, I discovered that it was more motivating to the students to present first the exercises dealing with the most interesting categories (food or eating, color, and animals) and the most familiar like religion. The students found the technical vocabulary of farming, power, or math and science the most difficult. As a consequence, I presented this vocabulary in the later part of this vocabulary unit. TESOL Arabia Perspectives
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Why Teach Challenging Vocabulary?
Design of the Activities
Some might argue against teaching students who are not competing in the Scripps Spelling Bee challenging vocabulary. For example, only two of the Study Words (cotton and sugar) are listed in the 1000 high frequency word list and only two (average and magazine) are found in the 2000 high frequency word list (West, 1953). None of the 51 Study Words are listed in the Academic Word List (Coxhead, 2005). None of the 31 Challenge Words are found in any of the three lists. However, the enrichment of the students’ lexicon can be extended to include these words. Unfortunately, vocabulary mastery has been deemphasized and even neglected for many years. This lack hinders student success in language learning. Indeed, Saville-Troike (1984) reminds us that, “Vocabulary knowledge is the most important aspect of oral English proficiency for academic achievement.”
In designing the activities, I drew on several approaches to facilitate learner interaction with the words: a crossword puzzle, collocations, a story about a word, scrambled words, missing letters and matching tests. I also included antonyms in some activities because associating opposites facilitates vocabulary acquisition (Nation, 1990) such as item 4 in Exercise 9, which defines muslin as a rough, coarse (not soft) cotton fabric.
Because learning the meaning of vocabulary in English is particularly difficult for Arab speakers due to the lack of positive transfer (Swan & Smith, 1987), perhaps acquiring the English vocabulary derived from their native tongue provides scaffolding between their L1 and L2. Only a few technical terms like radar or television have been absorbed in Arabic. I also discovered that the students were frequently blocked from connecting the English with the Arabic due to pronunciation differences, particularly the quality of the stress placed on the vowel as in the words coffle or diffa (Hyatt El Samad, personal communication, December 27, 2009). Actually, the students know this vocabulary from their high school studies. Usually, one student would suddenly realize that I was using English stress and explain that to the class. The rest of the class could then identify the word meaning and acquire the English pronunciation. Many native Arabic speakers find using the correct English word stress challenging because English word stress is unpredictable. The word stress of Arabic is regular and predictable. In Arabic, only the consonants and long vowels are stressed and give meaning Jane Hoelker is on the Board of while the short Directors of TESOL, Inc. and is a Past President of TESOL Arabia. She has vowels are practically published in international educational allophonic and journals and magazines and has therefore, sometimes presented at numerous conferences. She has worked in Rwanda, Mali, even skipped (Swan & Japan, Korea, the UAE and Qatar. Smith, 1987).
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The seven categories and the eleven words that describe them are introduced to the students through a crossword puzzle. Two categories are described by two words and one by three. I used a crossword puzzle because its graphic nature highlights the words and their spelling for the learners’ eyes. To support learners in mastering the vocabulary of food and eating (Exercise 2), the food nouns are collocated with the verbs with which they are associated such as to peel an orange. The same pattern was used in designing Exercise 7, dealing with vocabulary about animals. For example, gazelle is included under the verb, run. In Exercise 5, which deals with the vocabulary of color, the adjectives are matched with the appropriate nouns. The learning of vocabulary is greatly facilitated through groupings as those described above or collocations (Lewis, 2000). Collocations are habitual word patterns as small as a two-word cluster or as long as sentence-length (usually not more than six words) and they are numerous in English. Collocations occur in both the spoken and written English language (both technical and non-technical). Seven words (taj, guitar, sequin, nenuphar, macramé, ghoul and mohair) did not fall under one of the seven categories so I researched the background information of each and wrote a brief story about the words to set them within a context which demonstrates their connection to Arabic (Exercises 3, 6, 8, 10, 12, 14 and 17). For instance, a passage quoted from One Thousand and One Nights discusses, nenuphar, the Arabic word for water lily. Students find it easier to learn vocabulary words that are practiced in meaningful contexts. As explained above, the students found the technical vocabulary of farming, power, or math and science the most difficult. To support them in comprehending the meaning seemed to be most important. TESOL Arabia Perspectives
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Therefore, I designed two of the activities so that the definitions appeared on the left or first to their eyes and the vocabulary words followed. In Exercise 9 which treated the farming vocabulary (a topic not so unfamiliar to my students), they had to match the word to the definition. In Exercise 11, which focused on the vocabulary of power, leadership, government, and the military, the word with two, three, or four of its letters missing followed the definition and the class filled in the missing letters. The vocabulary about math and science was the most challenging for the learners, so I used a slightly different design with three steps for Exercise 13. First, the vocabulary was highlighted at the beginning of the activity in a box so that the students could read the words first and concentrate on the spelling and pronunciation. Then the students matched the boldfaced words and phrases in the sentences (first introduced in the box) with the definitions listed after the sentences.
Conclusion
References Arnold, J. (1999). Affect in language learning. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press. Coxhead, A. (2005). Essentials of teaching academic vocabulary (English for academic success). Orlando, Florida: Houghton Mifflin Company. Lewis, M. (2000). Teaching collocation: Further developments in the lexical approach. Hove, England: Language Teaching Publications. Nation, I.S.P. (1990). Teaching and learning vocabulary. New York, NY: Newbury House. Rogerson, H., Hershelman, S., Jasnow, C. & Moltz, C. (1992). Words for students of English: A vocabulary series for ESL. Ann Arbor, Michigan: University of Michigan Press. Saville-Troike, M. (1984). What really matters in second language learning for academic achievement? TESOL Quarterly, 18, 216. Swan, M. & Smith, B. (1987). Learner English. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press. ❉
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To sum up, all 82 vocabulary words of the Study (51) and Challenge (31) Words are practiced at least once in the series of activities. Some are used in several activities because they illustrate a couple of categories. While it is possible to teach all the exercises as one unit of vocabulary over two or three days, it is also feasible to isolate one or more activities and use it or them to supplement a chapter in a vocabulary textbook or a vocabulary exercise in a course book. As I stated in the introduction to this article, I decided to develop a lesson on English vocabulary derived from the Arabic for use with my students to motivate them to study English. They take enormous pride in their native tongue and in discussing the contribution of the Arabic language to other languages of the world. I wanted to leverage this pride to motivate them to learn English words: their meaning, spelling and pronunciation. To build further on this pride, I asked each student at the end of the unit of work which word was their favorite. When they told me, I reached for each individual’s hand to thank them for giving the English language and me that word. Every student smiled and shook my hand.
Acknowledgements Thank you to Hyatt El Samad in the English Foundation Program at Qatar University for her input on several points of pronunciation and vocabulary meaning.
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Words Borrowed from the Arabic by the English Language (http://myspellit.com)
Menu of Activities LET’S LEARN THE MEANING # of items
Topic of the exercise
What to do in each exercise
1
Categories
7
Complete a crossword puzzle.
2
Food, eating
13
Write a word under the correct verb.
3
A story about a word: taj
2
Complete the story. Write the missing letters in the blanks.
4
Religion
10
Unscramble the letters to spell words.
6
Unscramble the letters and write the color that modifies the noun in the picture.
1
Complete the story. Write the missing letters in the blanks.
5
6
Color
A story about a word: guitar
7
Animals
6
Write the nouns under the correct verb.
8
A story about a word: sequin
1
Complete the story. Write the missing letters in the blanks.
9
Farming
12
Match a word with the definition.
10
A story about a word: nenuphar
1
Complete the story. Write the missing letters in the blanks.
11
Power, Government, Leadership or the Military Part A
10
Fill in the missing letters.
1
Complete the story. Write the missing letters in the blanks.
12
Match the sentences with a definition.
1
Complete the story. Write the missing letters in the blanks.
12 13 14
A story about a word: macrame
Math, science A story about a word: ghoul
Total number of items presented in 14 activities
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Directions. What are the seven (7) categories under which many of the words derived from the Arabic are grouped? Find the eleven (11) words to fill in the puzzle. There are six (6) words across and five (5) down. Two (2) categories are described by two (2) words. One category is described by three (3) words. 1
S
3
2
F
1
F
C
2
E 4 3
L
4
A
R
5
G
5
M
6
M
Across 1
A quality of light (like red, blue or green) that enables a person to see things
2
Taking food in through the mouth to chew and swallow
3
Living things like cats, giraffes or birds like the albatross that are different from living things like plants and flowers
4
Relationship to and worship of a Higher Being
5
The organization who rules and controls a group of people like a city or country
6
Of or relating to soldiers and armed forces like the army or air force
Down 1
A system of knowledge about biology, astronomy or the study of the stars, or chemistry
2
What people consume or take into the mouth, chew and swallow when they are hungry
3
The act of growing crops and plants to sell as food to people
4
The act or ability to lead, govern and inspire people
5
The study of numbers and their relationships like adding, subtracting, multiplying, etc. Volume 18
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Exercise 2. Food and Eating Directions. There are 13 words borrowed from the Arabic language by English that describe food or are related to eating. List them under the correct action. Some words may be used more than one time. The actions describe what the host does to prepare for or what the guests do at an Arabic reception or banquet which is called a
I
F
To slice
To peel
To drink
To sprinkle
To spread
\\\
1) a _________ (7 letters) 2) l _________
4) a _________
6) j __________
9) t _________
12) t ________
5) o _________
7) t __________
10) s ________
13) m ________
juice 3) o _________
8) c _________
11) s ________
of water
Exercise 3. A Story About a Word Directions. Read the short story about a word and write the letters missing in the two words. The number of letters needed for each of the two words is given in parentheses below. A hat without a brim that is shaped like a cone or is curved on top is called a __ __ __ . It comes from the Arabic meaning, “crown.” The __ __ __
(3)
__ __ __ __ __ (5) is a mausoleum (where dead people are buried) in Agra, India,
built by Emperor Shah Jahan in memory of his favorite wife Mumtaz Mahal, . It is considered “The Jewel” of Muslim art in India.
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Exercise 4. Men, Places or Practices of Religion Directions. Write the ten (10) words describing men, places or practices of religion. Number one is completed. 1)
alim mlai (from Malay)
2) _____________________ zfhia
3) ____________________ llaah
4) ____________________ mmai
5) _____________________ iicslma
6) ____________________ nmtraei
7) _____________________ qmsoeu
8) ___________________ hrko
9) ___________________ bhmrai
10) _____________________ aaalms
Exercise 5. Colors Directions. Write the color in front of the noun it often modifies or with which it is written. There are six (6) colors borrowed by English from the Arabic. 1) ____________________ tree
nmloe
2) _______________________ blossom
3) _________________ skies
aeurz
4) _______________________ bush
5) ____________________ rose
nmcraei
6) _____________________ blood
orange
aicll
nmrcsoi
Exercise 6. A Story About a Word Directions. Read this short story about a word borrowed from the Arabic. Write the missing word after reading the sentences below. The word, __ __ __ __ __ __, was adopted into English from Spanish and from the medieval Andalusian Arabic. This instrument was developed from the four-string oud, brought by the Moors after their conquest of Iberia (Spain) in the 8th century.
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Exercise 7. Animals Directions. There are six (6) words borrowed from the Arabic language by English that name animals. List them under the correct action. Fly
Run
1)
2) 3) 4) 5)
Exercise 8. A Story About a Word Directions. Read this short story about a word borrowed from the Arabic. What word is related to money in this short paragraph about fashion in women’s clothing? __ __ __ __ __ __ s got their name from the Arabic sikka, meaning a coin. In the 13th century, the local public mint of Venice produced gold coins known as zecchin or zecchino. The French changed the Venetian word to its present form as an English word. These coins were used for centuries throughout the Mediterranean, especially near the Persian Gulf. In the cultures where these coins circulated, people stitched coins to women’s clothing, particularly headdresses and face veils. This was a way to display and store the family wealth. Later, this led to their use with fabric and as trims in modern fashion.
Exercise 9. Farming Directions. Match the 10 words related to farming with the definition to the left. Number one (1) is an example. Ex: C
1) a mineral used to clean, to soften water, and to fireproof
a) monsoon
2) the rainy season in India and countries near India
b) muslin
3) a fabric made from the long, silky hair of the Angora goat
c) borax
4) a rough, coarse (not soft), cotton fabric
d) adobe
5) bricks made from clay earth
e) mohair
6) an underground conduit for water in desert country (as in the Sahara)
f) alkali
7) a plant that produces a soft (not coarse or rough), white substance that can be woven into fabric to make clothes
g) serdab
8) a plant used to make hay that horses and other animals eat
h) foggara
9) in agriculture or farming, a mixture of salts that results in dry soil
i) tuna
10) flat-jointed prickly pears or cacti
j) khor
11) a living room in the basement of a house in the Near East that provides coolness during the summer months
k) alfalfa
12) a channel through which water flows either continuously or intermittently (as seasonally)
l) cotton Photocopiable TESOL Arabia Perspectives,Vol. 18,
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Exercise 10. A Story About a Word Directions. Read the short story about a word borrowed from the Arabic. Write the name of the beautiful flower described in 1001 Nights by Sheherazad. Write one letter on each space below to spell the word and identify the flower.
Arrived at the stall of a fruiterer, she bought Syrian apples, Osmani quinces, peaches from Uman, jasmine of Aleppo, Damascene __ __ __ __ __ __ __ __ s (8), cucumbers from the Nile, limes from Egypt, Sultani citrons, myrtle berries, flowers of henna, blood-red anemones, violets, pomegranate bloom, and the narcissus. --The Thousand Nights and One Night, translated by Powys Mathers.
Exercise 11. Power, Government, Leadership or the Military Directions. The ten (10) words below relate to power, government, leadership or the military. Write the missing letters to spell the words. Number one (1) is completed.
1) where the army keeps guns, swords & weapons
a r s e n a l
2) customs at the border between two countries where travelers pay tax
d __ u __ n e
3) where things are stored
__ a __ a __ i __ e
4) a person of great wealth or power
n __ b __ b
5) the king of a Muslim country
__ u __ t a __
6) a danger
h __ __ a __ d
7) local chief who gives orders to his followers in some parts of Central Asia
m __ __ h __ __ r
8) the head of the local government of a town 9) a living room in the basement of a house in the Near East that provides coolness during the summer months 10) a leader on a large boat or in the navy who gives orders to the sailors
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Exercise12. A Story About a Word Directions. Read this short story about a word borrowed from the Arabic. Write the missing letters to complete the word. The art or handicraft of __ __ __ __ __ __ __ is believed to have originated with 13thcentury Arab weavers. After the Moorish conquest, the art was taken to Spain. It has been used by sailors to make hammocks or belts, and to decorate anything from knife handles to bottles to parts of ships. Exercise 13. Math and Science Preview the vocabulary. These 12 words in the box are boldfaced in the article. They relate to math or science. Words to Watch elixir camphor algorithn algebra
talc zero bezoar azimuth
nadir average alchemy zenith
Directions. Read the following sentences. Then match the boldfaced words and phrases with the definitions below. Write the correct letter in the space provided. If you need more help, read the sentence in the article where the word appears and think about how it is used. _____ 1. Because Abdulaziz and Mohamed studied very hard for the math test they received the two highest grades. But the class average was still so low that the teacher repeated the lesson for the rest of the students who failed after school. _____ 2. The ancient Greeks seemed unsure about the status of zero as a number. They asked themselves, “How can nothing be something?” It is said that the Indians were the first to use zero as an individual number like the numbers one and two. _____ 3. Baby Miriam cried for a long time because her skin was red and scratchy. The mother put soft talc on the baby’s skin to comfort her and she finally stopped crying. _____ 4. Captain Youseh could not calculate the azimuth correctly. The storm was coming and he needed to figure out which way to steer the ship to avoid the storm. _____ 5. Professor Ali used many substances to try to turn the cheap lead into gold. Actually, he spent all his life searching for the elixir, but he never succeeded in finding it. _____ 6. Sami studied all night for the algebra test, and his head was swimming with letters and numbers. He was so happy to see a passing math grade when he got his grade. _____ 7. Khalid was suffering greatly and in pain from the terrible poison. He tried to remember where he put the bezoar so he could cure himself and not die. _____ 8. The famous scientist, Alanood, found a very old book about the science of alchemy that explained how to turn cheap lead into gold. But she knew this was impossible. _____ 9. Almayasa taught the rules of the algorithm lesson in class, and the students said they understood. That night at home they tried hard to do the problems, but they could not complete the homework. _____ 10. While camping in the desert for a week, Fathima used camphor to keep the mosquitoes away. She did not get bitten once by the bugs. _____ 11. Sara was at the zenith of her career as a professor when her book on how to learn English was published. Her family was very proud of her success. _____ 12. Ahmed spent so much money on cars and expensive clothes that he had no more money to study at the university in London. He was very sad and at the nadir of his young life.
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A system of math in which the letters represent numbers The mean score; the normal score important for sailing a boat: horizontal direction expressed as the angular distance between the direction of a fixed (not moving) point and the direction of the object small stones (formed from mineral salts) foundin the intestines of some animals as the gazelle and long ago thought to be a sure antidot forpoison ancient science that claimed to change ordinary metals into gold high point having no quantity; not any A precise rule (or set of rules) explaining exactly how to solve some problem a substance that the alchemists believed could change base metals into gold long ago the lowest point; opposite zenith a very soft and white mineral that is in very, very small pieces that is rubbed on babies or sore areas of the body and that feels like soap gum or resin from the wood and bark of the camphor tree and used to keep insects away or to heal a wound
Exercise 14. A Story About a Word Directions. Read this short story about a word borrowed from the Arabic. Then write the missing letters to spell the word.
A jinn or a mythological monster is sometimes called a
__ __ __ __ __. According to ancient Arabian stories and legends, this creature dwells in burial
grounds and places where no people live like the desert. It can take the shape of an animal and lead travelers into the deep desert where it kills and eats them. Scientists deny the existence of such creatures.
Words Borrowed from the Arabic by the English Language (http://myspellit.com) Study Words (51) admiral adobe albatross alchemy alcove alfalfa algebra apricot arsenal artichoke average azure borax
carmine cotton crimson elixir gazelle ghoul giraffe guitar hazard henna imam Islamic khan
lemon lilac macramé magazine mahal massage mattress mohair monsoon mosque mummy nabob orange
safari saffron sequin sugar sultan taj talc tariff tarragon tuna zenith zero
coffle diffa douane fennec foggara hafiz halal julep
khor marzipan mihrab minaret mukhtar muslin nadir nenuphar
Qatari salaam serdab serendipity Swahili tahini tamarind
Challenge (31) alcazar algorithm alim alkali azimuth bezoar camphor carafe
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Words Borrowed From Arabic by the English Language (http://myspellit.com) Menu of Activities Answer Key Exercise 1. Seven Categories
Exercise 2. Food and Eating
Across
Down
1. color 2. eating 3. animals 4. religion 5. government 6. military
1. science 2. food 3. farming 4. leadership 5. math
diffa To slice 1. apricot 2. lemon 3. orange
To peel 4. artichoke 5. orange
To drink 6. julep 7. tamarind juice 8. carafe of water
To sprinkle 9. tarragon 10. sugar 11. saffron
To spread 12. tahini 13. marzipan
Exercise 4. Men, Places or Practices of Religion Exercise 3. A Story About a Word
1. alim 4. imam 7. mosque 10. salaam
taj, Taj Mahal
2. orange blossom 4. lilac bush 6. crimson blood
Sequins
Exercise 10. A Story About a Word nénuphar
7. L 8. K 9. F 10. I 11. G 12. H
Exercise 11. Power, Government, Leadership or the Military 1. arsenal 2. douane 3. magazine 4. nabob 5. sultan
1. B 3. K 5. I 7. D 9. H 11. F
macramé
Exercise 14. A Story About a Word ghoul
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No. 2
6. hazard 7. khan 8. mukhtar 9. serdab 10. admiral
Exercise 13. Math and Science
Exercise12. A Story About a Word
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Exercise 8. A Story about a Word
Run 2. gazelle 3. giraffe 4. fennec 5. coffle
Exercise 9. Farming 1. C 2. A 3. E 4. B 5. D 6. H
3. halal 6. minaret 9. mihrab
Exercise 7. Animals Fly 1. albatross
Exercise 5. Colors 1. lemon tree 3. azure skies 5. carmine rose
2. hafiz 5. Islamic 8. khor
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2. G 4. C 6. A 8. E 10. L 12. J
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Postscript: Cynical, Cowardly, Ignorant, Libelous, and Unprofessional In Perspectives 18(1), I published a short article entitled “Cynical, Cowardly, Ignorant, Libelous and Unprofessional.” I am pleased to say that I received a certain amount of feedback regarding this article. Several colleagues in Oman appeared to support what I had written, but there is always one person who insists on marching out of step, and this person surfaced on March 15, posting on the Saudi Arabia threads of David’s ELT World. Safely camouflaged by an “avatar,” he opined that my article was “a nauseating brown-nosing piece acusing (sic) Dave’s esl café (sic) contributors of racism because they were taking the piss out of a third rate attempt at a university.” So let me just say this about that. Further abusing the Imam Mohammed bin Saud Islamic University merely compounds the reason for my original complaint. I have no personal interest in defending that university, nor do I seek to ingratiate myself with its administration. I am perfectly content in my present post at the Sultan Qaboos University in Oman.
Neil McBeath Sultan Qaboos University Sultanate of Oman
So far as my critic is concerned, however, I would suggest that he has most effectively proved my point about behaving “in socially unacceptable ways.” He has himself demonstrated behaviour that is cynical, cowardly, ignorant, libelous, unprofessional and, dare I say, vulgar to boot.
Neil McBeath has taught in the Arab Gulf for 30 years, first serving as a uniformed Education Officer in the Royal Air Force of Oman (1981-2005), then with BAE Systems in Saudi Arabia, and from 2007 at Sultan Qaboos University. In 2006 he received the TESOL ARABIA Professional Services Award.
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Cambridge Un Office F-27, B Knowledge Village PO Box 502915 Dubai, United Arab Emirates
Ideal reading practice for students of English for Academic Purposes
email: office@cupdubai.org tel: +971 4 3672166 fax: + 971 4 3678632
www.cambridge.org/elt
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Emerging Technologies
Simple Audio with Myna
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John Allan edlinc.ca Learning Management System Ontario, Canada
Aviary (http://www.aviary.com/) is a collection of specialized software available online. It is web-based, free and stable. This powerful suite of creative applications can be used right in your web browser. Although the target audience is the art and design community, Aviary also provides language learning materials developers with all the tools they need to produce effective and professional visuals and audio. You can capture screens with Talon, edit photos with Phoenix, create vector (line art) images with Raven, add special visual effects with Peacock, paint or select colors with Toucan, and optimize images for digital presentations with Falcon.
Stephen Roney Jubail Industrial College Saudi Arabia
Myna also works well with social media sites such as Digg (http://digg.com/), Facebook and Twitter. For feedback and true Web 2.0 collaboration, students or fellow educators can also easily comment on the audio through hosting agents such as blogs or YouTube, among other options. Besides being easy to use, the term “intuitive” comes to mind. Myna’s web interface also looks slick and attractive. This can be important and motivating to sophisticated, web-savvy students. Such students will already be familiar with Myna functions like sharing, tagging, and workflow, which are common to most Web 2.0 online applications.
However, Aviary is good for more than just a pretty face. Our special focus is Myna, Aviary's online audio editor. Myna is a simple and easy, not to mention affordable, way to upload, record, or remix audio clips online, either for projects with your students in a computer lab, or to produce listening materials for your teaching requirements. In a nutshell, Myna is a multi-track audio editor, with the accent on ease of use. Quick and simple movements of the mouse produce drag-and-drop clip placement, snap-to tempo, and smooth and easy fading and panning. For an online application, you will find Myna amazingly agile. Labeling, titling, and tagging are completed quickly in oversized textboxes. The final audio product, whether it is a listening text, a test, or a student-produced dialogue, can be quickly uploaded to the web at Aviary.com or saved as an MP3 file for use with a digital music player. Along with its other features, this export flexibility makes Myna a strong option when selecting audio editors. Volume 18
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Aviary is a free online video and audio editing software suite.
This being so, Myna is also highly suitable for student projects. We as teachers are thus free to introduce the linguistic concept and let the students champion the
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in our TESOL Electronic Village Online course. Our course, “Digital Materials Preparation Techniques,” utilized this online audio editor to create rich sound files for EFL/ESL. We found participants were surprised at the power of Myna as well as its simplicity of use. We suggested to the teacher-participants that they produce a poem in full audio using Myna. To our delight, we ended up with over forty teacher-created poems posted at the course! Myna audio editing software is free and easy to use.
technology. Nevertheless, we recommend that the instructor step through any such assigned task at least once for themselves before unleashing the students on an online resource. Some students may still require guidance beyond what is available from online PDF help files or animated tutorials.
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Foster the Future of the United Arab Emirates
English Teaching Opportunities at the Higher Colleges of Technology The Higher Colleges of Technology (HCT) is one of the Middle East’s leading Higher Education institutions with over 19,000 students and 2000 staff. English is the language of instruction and courses are taught to Western standards. Our rapid expansion since foundation in 1988 to 17 campuses across the UAE would not have been possible without the high calibre of education professionals from around the globe that the HCT has attracted over the years. As we continue to expand, so do the opportunities for English language teaching professionals. The United Arab Emirates is one of the most progressive and forward thinking countries in the Middle East. From fine dining in 5 star hotels to paragliding from beautiful beaches, HCT and the UAE can offer both the career opportunity and the lifestyle in a safe, tolerant society. We offer a competitive benefits package including a tax free salary with free accommodation, medical coverage, tuition assistance for dependent children, 48 days holiday, annual vacation flights and a generous contract completion bonus. If you are interested in English Language Faculty opportunities at HCT you can apply online at http://recruit.hct.ac.ae
We have used Myna with great success
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The Educator
For such projects, we suggest that the students complete a set of development tasks related to the assigned undertaking. Creating audio with language students should be much more than simply taking them into a recording area and asking them to talk into the microphone. Tasks can include: brainstorming imagery for the project, formatting and generating an audio script, assigning roles, and, of course, making the actual recording. In addition, the instructor should define parameters of length or time, and linguistic targets (emotion, register, tense, etc.). Using standard script formats can prevent some from straying from the point and creating long or unfocused work. Language teachers should also try to keep these assignments simple, so as not to allow technology to dominate language use. For example, it is best not to require background sounds (actuality) or John Allan is an elearning designer on the edlinc.ca Learning Management System in complex Ontario, Canada. Stephen Roney teaches situations with writing at Jubail Industrial College, KSA. He more than two is a former software designer and past president of the Editors' Association of speakers. Canada. Together John and Stephen run the socialesl.com website promoting technology for language teachers and CALL courses for TESOL's Electronic Village Online.
See our complete recommended procedure for doing this with Myna at http://edtechisus.com/wpcontent/uploads/2010/12/socialesl_myna1.pdf. We dare you to try it for yourself. It may also give you some ideas for projects with your own students.
Learn more at www.hct.ac.ae email: recruit@hct.ac.ae
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Teaching Online: Tools and Techniques, Options and Opportunities Nicky Hockly with Lindsay Clandfield Delta Publishing, 2010 ISBN: 978-1-905085-35-4 112 pp
Do you want to add an online component to the courses that you teach, but you fear it? Do you want to create an online learning environment for your students, but you are not a techie? Don’t panic and have no fear! Teaching Online: Tools and Techniques, Options and Opportunities is here to take your hand and tour you in the world of online teaching. Teaching Online is a very practical guidebook for teachers who want to experience online teaching. The book is divided into seven major sections. In the first section, Hockly and Clandfield define a number of important key terms that every teacher who wants to develop an online learning environment, whether blended or totally online, needs to know. In the second section of the book (Chapter 1), the authors provide readers with a wide range of activities that can be used at the beginning of online courses in order for the teacher and learners to get to know each other. In addition to that, the authors provide readers with suggestions about how each activity can be adapted using different tools and techniques. In the third section of the book (Chapter 2), the authors provide readers with ideas to develop students’ reading and writing skills in online learning environments, and familiarize readers with a number of Web 2.0 tools which can be employed by teachers in online courses. In the next section of Teaching Online (Chapter 3), the authors introduce a variety
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of different activities that can enhance students’ listening and speaking skills in online learning environments. In the fifth section of the book (Chapter 4), readers are provided with ideas and activities to evaluate students’ progress in online courses. In the following section, Hockly and Clandfield discuss different activities through which teachers can give a sense of closure to their students in online courses. Finally, Hockly and Clandfield conclude the book with a section intended to provide teachers with online resources on personal and professional development (e.g., discussion groups, conferences, blogging, etc.). A closer look at Teaching Online: Tools and Techniques, Options and Opportunities reveals that the book is a very practical guide for teachers who want to experience teaching in an online environment. The book does not limit itself to providing its readers with theoretical knowledge on the use of online tools and learning environments. Rather, Hockly and Clandfield present a wide range of activities that are very useful, interesting, practical, easy to set up, and fun to use, and offer a list of relevant suggested websites teachers can make use of in their online courses. In addition to that, the book provides readers with a list of search terms for each of the Web 2.0 tools it introduces. Thus, when you start reading the book you do not feel that you are lost in an unknown world.
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In Teaching Online: Tools and Techniques, Options and Opportunities, Hockly and Clandfield build on their personal and professional experience with online teaching, which in turn makes the book an excellent support for teachers who want to deliver blended or online courses for the first time, or teachers who want to improve their knowledge of online teaching. The book is also a very good resource for MA TESOL students as well as participants of teacher training programs, and provides them with novel ideas to implement technology in their lesson plans, peerteaching practices, and teaching demonstrations. Furthermore, the book serves as a good source of information for teachers who seek online professional and personal development, and encourages them to join different online professional communities. Teaching Online: Tools and Techniques, Options and Opportunities promises to give practical suggestions to readers interested in online teaching about ways to set up a successful blended or online course, tools to use to make their online teaching effective, and techniques to employ to get the best out of their online teaching experience. The book, as the authors claim, focuses on the theory of online teaching, its practice, and online professional development. These claims are all accomplished by the time readers reach the final chapter of the book. Moreover, the book presents a very realistic view of online teaching to its readers. It touches on not only the advantages of using each of the activities which aim to enhance students’ four skills of reading, writing, listening, and speaking, and linguistic skills of grammar, vocabulary, and pronunciation, but also the drawbacks of each of the activities. It also suggests precautions teachers might need to take and variations they might need to make while using any of the suggested activities.
the world of online teaching. All in all, Teaching Online: Tools and Techniques, Options and Opportunities is a very useful, practical, and clear guide for teachers interested in setting up online courses or teachers who would like to add an online component to the face-to-face courses they offer. More importantly, the book can serve as an excellent support for teachers who are teaching online courses and need pedagogical support to carry on.
Reviewed by: Shahla Yassaei American University of Sharjah Sharjah, UAE
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A very important point that should be noted is that the book is written in very clear, simple, and straightforward language with minimal use of technical terms. Each time a new term is introduced, the authors provide a very simple and understandable definition of the term. Therefore, readers do not have to be competent in computer use and technology to be able to understand the book. In fact, classroom teachers interested in the use of technology in ELT will find the book an interesting initial pathway to Volume 18
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Business Business Communication Issues Michael Black Black Cat Publishing, 2009 ISBN: 978-88-530-0932-6 96 pp
Michael Black Black Cat Publishing, 2009 ISBN: 978-88-530-0934-0 80 pp
These three titles from Black Cat Publishing by Michael Black are part of the Reading and Training Professional series, in which vocabulary development and practice in the four skills derive primarily from texts related to areas of Professional English. Each book is in part intended to prepare students for the Cambridge ESOL Business English Certificate (BEC). Business Communication and Business Issues are geared towards the topics, types of texts and function of the BEC Preliminary Exam, while Business Environment is aimed at students preparing for the more advanced BEC Vantage, International Legal English Certificate (ILEC) or International Certificate in Financial English (ICFE) exams. The BEC, which is aligned with levels B1 to C1 of the Common European Framework for Languages, is officially recognized by over one thousand public and professional organizations as a suitable qualification for business use. The three titles are, therefore, likely to be
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Business Environment Michael Black Black Cat Publishing, 2009 ISBN: 978-88-530-0936-4 96 pp
viewed as essential preparation for these examinations. All three books in the series are divided into ten closely linked chapters and the theme of each chapter is explored through a variety of warm-up discussion activities, reading passages and listening comprehension activities. Reading comprehension exercises including scanning practice, word and definition matching and vocabulary recognition accompany the passages in each chapter. Grammar is tested through sentence transformation and gapfilling exercises while writing is practiced in a writing file and through links to a variety of online writing activities. As with the other series published by Black Cat, the design and layout of the business series is visually striking, filled with color photographs of high-octane business meetings in futuristic boardroom settings and peopled by attractive, power-dressed young professional men and women.
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Business Communication explores the meetings, decision making processes and presentations that enable any organization to function efficiently. Chapters on planning, writing and improving email correspondence and on how to shine in a job interview are of great practical value, but could, in point of fact, have been taken from any course book designed for professional learners of English. While the texts illustrate the various chapter themes with specific, business-related topics, the skills’ activities linked to these texts could be used in almost any professional or semi-professional situation. However, my deepest reservation about a book that focuses on communication in business is the scant attention given to the different cultures of communication in the business world. Speak to any American or British business person who has conducted business in Japan, China or the Middle East, and one will soon learn that although English is usually the medium of business communication, it does not necessarily erase the often profound cultural differences (and difficulties) of doing business in a non-western environment. The chapter, “Languages for Business” (Chapter 10) skirts this issue by concentrating on the importance of having bi- or multi-lingual workforces in companies that relocate abroad. It does not consider the fact that an American company operating in China, for example, may encounter communication problems that go way beyond the limitations of language per se. Business Issues concentrates on the internal processes and activities of companies and contains chapters on topics ranging from “Successful Industries” and “Financial Results” to “Motivating Staff ” and “Succession Planning.” The topics are generally wellchosen, being on the whole relevant to many international business environments. However, the range of topics is also highly selective and this makes one wonder for which students of business English this book has been prepared. The photographs, texts and exercises feature women in prominent roles and yet it is widely known that both gender inequality and organizational discrimination remain two of the most intractable problems facing businesswomen in Asia and the Middle East. Moreover, no mention is made of either the criteria for dispute resolution that companies need to have in place or the issue of redundancies during an economic downturn. The impression made by this book of an idealized Western corporate model is one that persists despite a handful
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of token references to non-Western companies and products. As a result, students of business English from non-western backgrounds might, with some justification, feel that they are being shown how to do business rather than simply acquiring the English language skills necessary to do business. Business Environment examines the way companies are actually run and how they relate to their customers, stakeholders, competitors and the public at large. Chapters such as “Competition,” “Advertising,” “Benchmarking” and “Investor Relations” explore global branding strategies, viral marketing and supplier management although the chapter on competition appears to ignore strategies in favor of obtaining a tactical advantage over one’s competitors. The absence of comparative case studies is an opportunity missed because, unlike the companion titles in this series, Business Environment includes a “Your Views” section at the end of each chapter, where students are invited to discuss an issue or make comparisons with the company they work for. One or two case studies that helped to illustrate some of the issues related to competition, for example, or the relationship between companies and the community, would provide students with both clearly focused discussion points and the chance to use new vocabulary items. While most people working in the corporate business sector subscribe to a set of given principles governing the management and competitiveness of business, cultural differences often have a profound effect on the ways companies actually do business across national borders. These three titles are exceptionally rich in vocabulary for the aspiring global businessperson but the Eurocentric, or Western, bias will probably lessen the appeal of these books to those from outside this tradition. With China and Japan currently the second and third largest economies and with India waiting impatiently in the wings, many of the cultural assumptions implicit in these books are likely to be challenged in the near future.
Reviewed by: Ian V. Cull CERT, Abu Dhabi Men’s College Abu Dhabi, UAE
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California Distance Learning Project: Adult Learning Activities http://www.cdlponline.org http://www.cdlponline.org is a website which was initially launched by the California Distance Learning Project (CDLP) to assist adult learners’ education by providing them with online activities that utilize simplified articles covering a variety of literacy levels and interests. The core units of lessons on this website are short and easy to understand with readings ranging between 250 and 350 words. An audio file that is available through a clickable button at the bottom of the page adds a valuable listening experience that offers excellent exposure to a flawless spoken pattern in the classroom. The audio files maximize the exposure to the target language which helps make up for for the minimal exposure to native English most students have in their EFL context. Furthermore, readings are supplemented with practice exercises using a bottom-up approach starting with the spelling of unfamiliar vocabulary in the passage to comprehension checks and culminating with an open-ended writing prompt promoting higher level thinking such as problem-solving. This in turn provides opportunities to recycle and incorporate newly introduced linguistic items and structures in a personal way when students attempt to express their thoughts. The beauty of cdlponline.org lies in how it can create a culture of reading among learners coming from oral cultures whose minimal linguistic resources hinder them from tackling extensive text. All the reading lessons at cdlponline.org proceed in a bottom-up approach which starts with readings followed by practice exercises including spelling drills, matching, and comprehension checks. This order is potentially beneficial for
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low-ability learners who think of reading as a daunting process. The belief is that reading involves processing at the “micro-level,” pattern recognition, letter identification, and lexical access, and the “macro-level,” such as the activation of the prior knowledge “schemata” (Erten & Razi, 2009, pp. 6061). It is strongly believed that the more we read, the better our ability to process written texts will be. Gebhard (1996) argues that the ability to recognize words, phrases, and sentences—“textdriven processing,” and the ability to use the background knowledge related to the content of reading—“conceptually-driven processing”— become much faster the more we read (pp. 195197). Using in-class web-based readings similar to those at cdlponline.org has the potential for advancing students’ text processing speed if it is conducted on a regular basis. Readings at cdlponline.org could be creatively utilized by teachers. My favorite approach is incorporating the readings into a sort of taskbased lesson which culminates in a dictogloss task. A dictogloss task is a variation of a dictation in which learners are required to reconstruct a short text they have listened to, and then “in small groups, the students … pool their resources to reconstruct their version of the original text” (Wajnryb, 1990, p. 5).
A screen capture shows the homepage of California Distance Learning Project's Adult Learning Activities.
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Gebhard, J. G. (1996). Teaching students to read for meaning. In G. J. Gebhard (Ed.), Teaching English for a second or foreign language: A self-development and methodology guide, (pp. 194-233). Ann Arbor, MI: University of Michigan Press. Wajnryb, R. (1990). Grammar dictation. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
The readings available at cdlponline.org are not a panacea for all the negative effects of little reading in L2. It is simply one possibility for teachers in the Middle East and elsewhere to consider utilizing in order to make reading in English a routine practice in the classroom. In addition, the variety of subjects of the readings represent one way of exposing students to culture through different approaches to tackle issues of a universal nature (e.g., truancy, bullying, video games, speeding, etc.). These readings, as such, would broaden students’ outlook about a foreign culture and ultimately feed into their intercultural competence which is a reward in its own right.
Reviewed by: Emad A. Jasim American University of Sharjah Sharjah, UAE
References Erten, I. H., & Razi, S. (2009). The effects of cultural familiarity on reading comprehension. Reading in a Foreign Language, 21(1), 60-77.
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TESOL ARABIA 2011 CONFERENCE PROCEEDINGS The Editor of the Proceedings of the 17th Annual TESOL Arabia Conference would like to invite you to submit a paper based on your presentation at the conference to be considered for publication in the next volume of the Proceedings. Only those who presented at the most recent TESOL Arabia Conference may submit articles for the Proceedings. Please send your article to Peter Davidson at Peter.davidson@zu.ac.ae Please follow the specifications outlined below: Articles should be between 3000-4000 words. Articles should be typed using Times New Roman, font size 12, with 1½ line spacing. If you include Tables and/or Figures, make sure they are no wider than 12 cms. Do not use color in Tables or Figures. Do not use footnotes. Only use "portrait" orientation (i.e. don't insert any pages in "landscape" orientation). Remove all hyperlinks. Include a complete list of references using APA style as outlined in the Publication Manual of the American Psychological Association, 6th edition (2009). Send articles electronically as a Word attachment. We will acknowledge receipt of articles within two weeks, except during the summer vacation in July and August.
Deadline for Submission: October 1, 2011
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World English 1 Martin Milner Heinle Cengage Learning, 2010 ISBN: 978-1-4240-5102-1 154 pp
contemporary spin on covering the basics.
National Geographic is a magazine known to just about everyone. It has been astounding the world since 1888. Renowned for its superlative quality photography, just picking up a copy and flicking through it is enough to be reminded of just how amazing the planet on which we live is. Yes, this world is amazing. Precisely the credo which informs World English 1, last year’s collaboration between National Geographic and Heinle ELT. Riffle though the Student Book and you’ll be struck by the quality of its layout and the lavish use of photography. Like its parent periodical, World English 1 is graphic, colorful and bold. And equally bold is the statement you’ll find emblazoned across the front cover: “Real People. Real Places. Real Language.” First, however, let’s start with an overview of the course components. Taken in sum, there are 13 separate elements to Level 1, which is itself but the first of three. These comprise a teacher’s guide, a workbook, CDs and so forth, everything one might expect of a modern integrated language course. Open to the "Scope and Sequence" pages and you will find the standard 12-unit format, encompassing such themes as travel, people, clothes, work and leisure. Structurally speaking, learners will be exposed to the past, present and future; functionally speaking, they will learn to give advice, express preference and order food in a restaurant. All in all, a syllabus which, while nothing ostensibly new, puts a
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Moving on to examine the claims of "Real people, Real Places, and Real English," the first point to note is that the “real people” who appear throughout the book are predominantly Eurasian and a good many of those “real places” appear affluent and first world. The cover pages for Unit 10, for example, “Lifestyles,” feature four photographs, three of which depict people (all of them European) and one of which shows the interior of a supermarket. The stated Unit Goals relate to evaluating and improving an unhealthy lifestyle, both concerns stemming from modern, urban, prepackaged living. So that leaves us with the “real language.” Consider, then, the following: “Angutikavsak is from Greenland, and he is a hunter. All his friends are hunters too. ‘It is a difficult life here. In winter, it is very cold. We are not rich, but we are happy,’ he says.” (Unit 2, Lesson D, p.10) This represents a classic example of dependent exemplification, and, once again, it brings a sense of the tried-and-trusted. Realistically, we might ask how useful the adjectives dangerous, safe, boring or frightened (all featured in this unit) are at this level of competence but in sum, the unit presents the material effectively.
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Another useful attempt to provide real language occurs on page 83 in the Student Book where the readers find a short glossary of text message abbreviations. This is indeed, “real language.” So real, in fact, that this reviewer needed the glossary to understand some of it. Here, then, applause is both justified and given. Ultimately, in spite of some of the issues mentioned above, World English 1 is reasonably effective in presenting and ordering the basics of the language. It is firmly communication-centered, with the emphasis falling squarely on listening and speaking, and while the grids, substitution exercises and gapfills may well hint at a slightly traditional approach to learning grammar, that is not necessarily a bad thing. There are people (and I am one of them) who are more than happy to learn this way. Taken in sum, World English 1 is well thought out, well designed, user-friendly and, to reiterate, hugely visually appealing.
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One final question, then: Is World English 1 likely to appeal in this region? Well, from a purely pedagogical standpoint, there is no reason why it should not. Indeed, its reassuringly familiar approach to structure and exponent presentation might even do it a favor or two. Yet, while the Gulf States in particular may be rising in global prominence, the Arab world in general remains largely overlooked in contemporary ELT materials. So it is with World English 1. Photo of the pyramids notwithstanding, you will find little or no coverage of local people or places within. Reviewed by: Colin Toms The Petroleum Institute Abu Dhabi, UAE
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openMind Student Book & Workbook, Level 2 Mickey Rogers, Joanne Taylore-Knowles & Steve Taylore-Knowles Macmillan Publishers’ Pre-publication Edition ISBN: 978-607-473-110-1 143 pp & 80 pp
The Mind series is a six-level American English course tailored for young adults. The aim of the series is to prepare students to be successful for this dynamic and global world, not only language skillswise, but also with regard to life skills, so they can successfully communicate and connect regarding their academic, professional and social lives. The series has two distinct levels: openMind and masterMind. The former covers beginner to preintermediate levels while the latter is concerned with intermediate and upper-intermediate levels. The openMind Level 2 Student Book and Workbook is for elementary level students. To keep things in perspective, these books correspond to learners who have an IELTS band 3 level of competence. The Student Book provides practice in the four skill areas including writing, speaking, reading and listening as a skill and their attendant sub-skills in twelve units covering topics like travel, technology, music, and food, which would surely appeal to young adults. Learners also get practice in language systems including vocabulary, grammar, pronunciation and functional language. Turning to life skills, learners engage in pair and group work activities where target language is recycled in meaningful, collaborative, engaging exchanges while learning useful social skills such as reaching a compromise, active listening, being assertive and personal space. On the academic/professional front, they learn about decision making, research, and considering alternate views, among others. Volume 18
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Looking through the first few pages of the book, the table of contents layout makes it very easy on the eye clearly identifying what each unit has in store skillswise. The life skills feature enhances the series’ worth and does, in fact, offer great opportunities to express opinions and to reflect on an evaluative level. On the right hand side of the contents page, your attention focuses on functional language, grammar, lexis and pronunciation in the given units. Before both teacher and students begin their openMind Level 2 experience, they are reassured that their time will be worthwhile as overall outcomes for each unit are clearly highlighted on page vi. What is more, each unit concludes with a language wrap-up to confirm students’ understanding of target language and vocabulary on a scale of 0 to 10. Taking into account the objectives for each of the appealing general interest units, I took a closer look at the collaborative, meaningful, interactive, engaging student-centered activities, hallmarks of a communicative lesson. All the units begin with a colorful pictorial opener appealing to visual learners. Schema is activated and the teacher may even notice students coming up with target language. In this regard, students are presented with an activity which could serve nicely in the framework of a text-based approach. This text-based approach unfolds in four steps guiding learners by having them notice patterns that the target language takes. From the pattern, they formulate ideas regarding form and use in controlled
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and freer practice activities. It would be helpful, however, if this approach were to include some attention to pronunciation of the target language. In each unit there are two grammar sections which also include a “Watch Out!” feature warning students of common student errors. One of the most pressing problems many teachers encounter with their students is the very narrow range of lexical resources that they can call upon. This textbook provides exercises which help to widen their range by having learners recognize synonyms and collocations which can greatly add to their ability to express themselves. The rationale behind the choice of lexical items is according to the level of frequent use as determined by Macmillan English Dictionaries. Typically, each unit includes two vocabulary tasks followed by an exercise in the unit’s language wrap-up section. Each unit includes at least ten pair and group work activities promoting both accuracy and fluency. These kinds of activities are so very vital in encouraging students to engage with the language and have an opportunity to work out meaning, again a sign of a communicative lesson. For example, many pair work activities have learners compare their answers before the teacher steps in with a key. On that note, it would be helpful to have an answer key at the back of the book, which provided answers for select exercises so as to promote learner independence. This principle of having students work out meaning for themselves is especially evident in the grammar section where students deduce rules about target language from the input. For instance, in teaching the past continuous, the students are given several examples of the target language before being given an opportunity to finish defining when we use the tense. This instance of language teaching practice is highly indicative of what to expect in each of the units. As with many core language texts, there does not appear to be a great variety of color, names or places beyond the Western pale aside from rare instances such as a world music feature and a comparison of ethnic foods and celebrations. For this particular setting in the Gulf, there is always the issue concerning the mixing of the genders and to what degree that is appropriate. A number of questionable examples are used which would probably cause a stir amongst the more socially reserved students. All in all, the openMind Level 2’s vision is very studentVolume 18
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centered as it creates an ample amount of opportunity for students to successfully communicate and connect as the book sets out to engage them so that they invest in their learning through guided discovery. Not forgotten in this appraisal is the Workbook which serves as a great supplement for reinforcement activities or remedial work for the struggling student.
Reviewed by: Hassan Hawash Abu Dhabi Men’s College Abu Dhabi, UAE
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Books Available for Review Contact cgunn@aus.edu New Headway Plus: Pre-Intermediate Oxford University Press, 2009 New Headway Plus: Pre-Intermediate (itools CD-ROM) Oxford University Press, 2009 Oxford English for Careers: Tourism 1 Oxford University Press, 2006 English Explorer 2 & 4 Heinle Cengage Learning, 2011 Practice and Pass Cambridge Young Learners English Test Movers Delta Publishing, 2010 Outcomes (Elementary, Intermediate, & Advanced) Heinle Cengage Learning, 2011, 2010, 2012 Read This! 1, 2, & 3 Cambridge, 2010 Writers at Work: From Sentence to Paragraph Cambridge, 2010 English Unlimited: Pre-intermediate Course Book, Study Pack, Teacher’s Book Cambridge, 2010
Graded Readers Hacker, Heinle Cengage Learning, 2011 Roommates, Heinle Cengage Learning, 2011 A Kitchen Love Story, Heinle Cengage Learning, 2011 Trust, Heinle Cengage Learning, 2011 The Long Road to Lucca, Heinle Cengage Learning, 2011
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Calendar of Upcoming Events June 23-25, 2011
The 33rd Language Testing Research Colloquium, “Half a Century of Language Testing,” University of Michigan, English Language Institute. Website: http://www.lsa.umich.edu/eli/LTRC2011
June 24-25, 2011
IATEFL, Business English Special Interest Group (BESIG), University of Central Lancashire, Preston, Lancashire, United Kingdom. Email: eleonor@iatefl.org Website: http://www.iatefl.org/events/sig-events
July 1-2, 2011
Korea Association of Teachers of English (KATE) International Conference, "Empowering English Teachers in the Globalization Era," Yonsei University, Korea. Email: tykim@cau.ac.kr Website: http://www.kate.or.kr
July 2-3, 2011
JALT CUE SIG (JALT College and University Educators SIG), "Foreign Language Motivation in Japan," Toyo Gakuen University, Hongo Campus, Tokyo, Japan. Website: http://cue2011conference.org
July 8-9, 2011
TESOL Symposium, "Sustainable Teacher Development Through Innovative Teaching and Research," Beijing Normal University, Beijing, China. Email: edprograms@tesol.org
September 3-6, 2011
First Extensive Reading World Congress, "Extensive Reading—The Magic Carpet to Language Learning,"Kyoto Sangyo University, Kyoto, Japan. Email: erwc1@erfoundation.org Website: http://erfoundation.org/erwc1
September 22-24, 2011
English Australia Conference, Adelaide, Australia. Email: info@eaconference.edu.au
September 24-25, 2011
3rd Sudanese International English Language Conference, “Towards Continuous Teacher Professional Development: Autonomous Teacher,” Khartoum, Sudan. Email: Rasha Elbashir, rshrsh2004@yahoo.com or Tajsir Bashoum, bashoum@gmail.com
October 1-3, 2011
TESOL Conference in Qatar, "Putting Research Into Practice," Qatar National Convention Centre, Doha, Qatar. Email: edprograms@tesol.org Website: http://www.tesol.org/researchintopractice
October 7-9, 2011
IATEFL-Hungary's 21st Annual Conference, “EMPOWER/ED” Shaping Learning Communities, Budapest, Hungary. Website: http://www.iatefl.hu/content.php?id=0177/
October 19-21, 2011
International Greening Education Event, Education for Sustainability, Karlsruhe, Germany. Website: http://www.etechgermany.com/IGEE2011.pdf
October 20-22, 2011
Ninth International Conference, Teaching English Language and Literature Society of Iran (TELLSI), “Global Perspective, Local Practice,” Ilam University, Iran. Email: tellsi9@ilam.ac.ir or r.khany@ilam.ac.ir
October 21-22, 2011
The 4th Postgraduate Conference on Issues in TEFL and English Literature, Tehran University, Iran. Email: fflconf@ut.ac.ir
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TESOL International Convention and Exhibit New Orleans, Louisiana, USA at our conferences, meetings and workshops are by far the widest in range and in quality of expertise invited to present.
Sufian Abu Rmaileh United Arab Emirates University Al Ain, UAE
As the Affiliate Leader Representative of TESOL Arabia at the 45th Annual TESOL International Convention and Exhibit, March 17-19, 2011, New Orleans, Louisiana, USA, I was able to attend and participate in the Affiliate Leaders’ meetings and workshops. It is important to note that there are 101 organizations affiliated with TESOL International. During the meetings, I was able to network with leaders from different parts of the world, each representing their own country. I was able to talk about TESOL Arabia and compare and contrast what we do with what those affiliates do. TESOL Arabia is seen to be ahead of the game. The professional development opportunities offered to our members
The first day of meetings started on March 16 with a full day schedule. We started with the introductions of the Affiliate Leadership Council (ALC), which is the body that organizes and represents the global affiliates in cooperation with TESOL staff. The ALC is made up of five elected members (ALC Past Chair, Donald Weasenforth, ALC Chair, Misty Adonion, ALC Chair-Elect, Karen Cadiera-Kaplan, Member A, Dorothy Forbin and Member A-Elect, Janet Pierce). After that, TESOL Professional Relations Manager, Valerie Borchelt, TESOL President, Brock Brady and TESOL Executive Director, Rosa Aronson were introduced. After the introductions of key ALC and TESOL leaders, a quick Speed Networking Activity was done to provide ideas on the organizations’ leaders and activities that are done by different affiliates. This proved to be very helpful as it provided participants with the opportunity to see what other affiliates do within their organizations.
Have you been to a professional development event or conference lately that you think TESOL Arabia members might benefit from? Consider writing a review of the event. Contact the editor for more information.
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Later, breakout sessions were organized for affiliate participants to attend on topics that covered orientation for new affiliate leaders such as organizational membership and fund raising as well as challenges and success and affiliate advocacy. Finally, Karen Cadiero-Kaplan concluded the first day with an evaluation of the sessions and reflections for future workshops. She also reminded the participants of the activities the ALC had organized for the participants. The second day of meetings I attended was the Affiliate Editors’ workshop which examined the kinds of print and publications each affiliate has. Again, TESOL Arabia by far seemed to be the best in professional publications and member benefits. We have a full-fledged, peer-reviewed magazine, Perspectives, Conference Proceedings and professional books published on different topics. There were a couple of things TESOL Arabia does not have. The first is a brochure that highlights TESOL Arabia as a professional organization for teacher development with information about the organization and contacts within the organization. The second is the lack of an online newsletter sent out to members about the organization or a professional online magazine. Those two issues could easily be overcome and the presence of hardcopy paper publications is a good defense.
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I would like to say that thanks to our members, supporters and sponsors, TESOL Arabia has developed a reputation for professional development and for being on top when it comes to what we do. The hard work the unpaid volunteers do is first class. Our organization is one of the best, not only regionally, but also internationally. â?‰
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The third day was again full of meetings. It started with the Affiliate Assembly where TESOL staff, leadership and the member representative of the board of directors met with and presented their reports to the Affiliate Leaders. During that day, I was able to attend Interest Section meetings and the Annual Business Meeting, which is equivalent to the Annual General Meeting of TESOL Arabia. During that time, the New President, TESOL Arabia’s own member and guru, Dr Christine Coombe, took over as the President of TESOL International in a celebration that fits such a position and person.
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On the fourth and last day, I attended TESOL International and Franklin Global Publisher meetings to organize and prepare for the 2nd TESOL Arabia SpellEvent which later took place at Dubai Men’s College on April 23, 2011.
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Doing Research in Applied Linguistics King Mongkut University of Technology Thonburi, Thailand
Nick Moore Khalifa University Sharjah, UAE
Assisted by a TESOL Arabia Travel Grant, I was able to attend the “Doing Research in Applied Linguistics” conference in April, 2011. The conference was hosted by King Mongkut University of Technology (KMUTT) in Thailand who cosponsored the event with Australia’s Macquarie University. The theme of the conference, “Doing Research in Applied Linguistics,” was very wellchosen as it was narrow enough to enable all participants to share a focus but broad enough to allow a wide variety of topics and responses. Plenary sessions by John Flowerdew (City University, Hong Kong, a late replacement for Guy Cook), Richard Watson Todd (KMUTT) and David Hall (Macquarie University, Sydney) all provided suitable frameworks so that speakers had common points of understanding. Professor Flowerdew discussed the wide range of quantitative and qualitative research methods that he used in a project that examined the processes and attitudes of Hong Kong academics writing in English for publication. Dr Watson Todd introduced us to Bayesian statistics and, by involving us in a task, he furthered our understanding. He characterised Bayesian statistics as allowing us to see a change in belief more accurately than normative statistics. Finally, Associate Dean David Hall asked us all to refrain from divisive approaches to research by considering the distinction between objective and subjective research as points on a cline rather than
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opposites, since the very involvement of an observer, or researcher, is likely to change the object of study, and so a researcher can never fully disassociate themselves from the research process. I found one of the points that David Hall made very thoughtprovoking. He challenged us all to reconsider some very basic concepts by no longer considering them as “things.” Scientific language has become pervasive and so has the corresponding tendency to turn processes into objects. Ideas that are commonly expressed as nouns, such as “love,” “identity,” and “research,” are better understood as the accumulation of actions and processes rather than as nouns. I attended a wide range of parallel presentations and a poster session. All presentations showed a clear focus on research issues and a number of themes were repeated through different papers. For instance, like myself, a number of presentations used models of language from Systemic Functional Linguistics, as did two of the plenary speakers. The research methodologies that were discussed ranged from strict experiments in structural priming to action research, from conversation analysis using transcriptions to case studies, and from corpus analysis to diary studies in reflexive action. I was able to pick up on some interesting points from many of the sessions that I attended. In the talk on conversation analysis, which used an interview between a language learning student and a foreign tourist, the presenter was able to show points in the conversation where the tourist was contributing to the discourse and points where he seemed to be uncooperative. Another talk, on structural priming, suggested that despite a very intensive research effort, the most significant factor that primes a response (or predisposes someone to reply with the same grammatical structure) is word order, regardless of language. This implies that structures in English
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My research project did not impose a psycholinguistic explanation on my experimental subjects, but tested a discourse model of text against readers’ perceptions and behaviours, allowing the subjects to co-construct the hypothesis.
that are affected by word order, such as passive voice, prime for a response in passive voice but other structural features, such as tense, do not have any effect on conversation. My presentation called for a re-evaluation of smallscale classroom-based studies which often have little validity or generalizability beyond a limited context. When investigating a model of text that was hypothesised to assist language learners with their reading, I chose to use the internet as a source of recruiting volunteers and to validate the model beyond language learning contexts. This resulted in much greater validity and generalizability for the model. I also challenged the claims of research that test hypotheses based on a theory of mind rather than the functioning of the brain. As the theory of mind itself is an unfalsifiable construct, because we are unable to prove the existence of anything metaphysical, these tests are ultimately unfalsifiable. ❉
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This conference offered a great chance for networking because it was just the right size – big enough to provide a variety of perspectives but small enough to establish contacts and to chat with anyone at the conference. The only complaint that was shared between participants was that the twenty minutes allocated to each presenter was simply too short to explain many of the complex concepts under examination; some presenters used the ten minute discussion section to finish their presentations, while others left their talk incomplete. I look forward to reading all of the papers that will appear in the proceedings in the near future, especially those that I missed at the conference. ❉
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A New Professional Journey Dr Christine Coombe TESOL President (2010-2013)
For the past two decades the Annual TESOL Convention has been part of my March calendar, but this year my attendance at the TESOL New Orleans Convention was special as it marked the achievement of a goal I have had for many years— being President of the association. I attended my first TESOL Convention in 1992 in Vancouver just as I was finishing my PhD. From the moment I walked into the convention center that year I was mesmerized. The selection of featured and concurrent sessions was intimidating but there was something for everyone on offer. I had never seen so many books and teaching materials as I did in the Exhibition and it was in Vancouver where I got my first job overseas from TESOL’s Employment Clearinghouse. Since then I have attended 18 TESOL Conventions. In 1996 I was asked to represent my affiliate, TESOL Arabia, at the annual affiliate leaders’ meetings and it was at these meetings in Chicago that the thought of participating in the leadership of the association first crossed my mind. I continued to represent TESOL Arabia at these meetings year after year and got involved in the EFL Interest Section. Gradually I learned about the association by volunteering for committees. In 2002 I was invited to serve on TESOL’s Professional Development Committee and it was from my service on this committee that I came to the attention of the nominating committee who convinced me to run for the Board. To make a long story short, I lost twice before I won, but in 2005 I was elected to serve as the Convention Chair for the Tampa 2006 Convention. Board service for TESOL is a three-year commitment and in those three years I learned as much about parliamentary procedure as I did about event planning. Both the learning curve and the workload were steep but Board service was probably one of the best decisions I have ever made in terms of my own professional development. In 2008 I made my first run for President and lost! Undeterred I decided to run Volume 18
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Dr Christie Coombe, President of TESOL, and Philip Lodge, Dubai Men’s College, are all smiles at the TESOL Convention in New Orleans, Louisiana.
again in 2009 and was elected becoming the first person from the Middle East to serve as TESOL President and only the third person from outside the United States. On March 19 during the Annual Business Meeting I was installed as TESOL President for the year 2011 to 2012. Quite frankly, with the exception of getting my doctorate, it was one of the most exciting moments of my life. It was made better still because of the presence of many TESOL Arabia members and HCT faculty in the audience. Since then my life has really changed. My emails have tripled, I am travelling almost every weekend and I feel I am making a difference for teachers all over the world. None of this would have been possible if not for my work with TESOL Arabia. The experience I gained from serving my affiliate has prepared me for this tremendous task. Thanks to the TESOL Arabia Executive Council members, SIG chairs, Area Reps and members for your support. I am proud to represent us in the global arena. ❉
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TACON Online: A Dream That Came True Ismail Fayed, Qatar University, Qatar Sebah Al-Ali, Dar Al-Hekma College, Saudi Arabia TACON Online Co-chairs 2011: http://taconference.org/2011
Background With the advent of the social web, users have managed to creatively utilize the web to serve their various needs and demands. One of them was the need for an online venue where teachers share their ideas and experiences to help each other develop their skills and professional careers. These venues, or as some would technically call them "online communities" (Rheingold, 1994, as cited in Preece & Maloney-Krichmar, 2003, p. 596), are commonly built in a way that allows users to communicate with each other at their leisure and exchange different kinds of expertise, resources, and information serving a common purpose, interest, or need among these users. In TESOL Arabia's interest to provide its members with all possible means of professional development, the board of TESOL Arabia decided to introduce TACON Online (TESOL Arabia Conference Online) in 2010. TACON Online started as an attempt to bring the TESOL Arabia conference to the world in parallel with the actual face-to-face annual conference in Dubai. Along with the high motivation the conference team had about this initiative, careful planning took place to make this initiative as beneficial for members as possible. Although the idea was not totally new in some parts of the world, it was still as such in the United Arab Emirates and the Middle East in particular. One of the challenges that we initially faced and that other organizations have highlighted to our team was related to funding this project. As a small-scale pilot project, we decided to go with open source systems, which are free open source scripts that any user can download and implement or change the core script for more personalized options. A few technical issues
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(e.g. filtering spam registrations and maintaining data backups) were faced, but were quickly resolved after getting to know the process with a clearer vision and details.
Observations and Lessons Learned TACON Online 2010 was initiated almost 6 weeks before the actual conference to give online participants the time and chance to build a virtual community before they actually attended the conference. The website also gave other users, including student teachers and educators, who were not coming to the conference, the chance to get engaged with the conference right from their home countries. The overall number of users in the first year exceeded 250 delegates from around 12 countries all over the world. The UAE and other Middle East countries represented the highest population of users. Based on feedback and observations gained from TACON Online 2010, TACON Online 2011 was rebuilt in an efficient manner that best serves participants and eases their communication and exchange of ideas and materials. The WordPress blogging system (http://wordpress.org) was installed as the primary script to create the online community. It was chosen for its ease of installation and customization, and simplicity of usage. The script was edited and customized by the TACON Online co-chairs. Various readily available plugins (add-ons) were used on the website to facilitate creating a desirable environment for members. Customizing the script also helped us in upgrading it from merely being a blog to an advanced system that integrates various elements (e.g., posts, forums, groups, member lists, and archives).
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The portal designers tried their best to keep the portal as simple and interactive for users as possible. To achieve this, several tools were introduced such as members’ profiles, blogs, discussion forums, conference updates, Dubai Debates discussions and surveys, activity feeds, comments by users, presentation handouts and presentations and Twitter streams. As a social network, each of these solutions was made available for registered users so that they could share their own content and conference experiences rather than just receive information about the conference (e.g., tweeting or commenting using the official hash tag TACON 2011 made all the website users see and read that person’s tweet or comment). Similar to the first year’s initiative, two months before the conference, users were invited to join and start sharing their ideas and thoughts about the conference theme and presentations. The website was also utilized during and after the conference to have presenters and plenary speakers share their handouts and/or presentations. Out of the first experience and our observation of similar projects in other regions, we decided to invite more volunteers from experts in the field to moderate this year’s platform. This successful decision helped in many ways to facilitate all the professional discussions and communications shared in the portal. It also encouraged the transition of participants’ roles of “visitors” or “lurkers” to “novice or regular” users who are more committed towards participation and interaction (Kim, 2000). Based on certain criteria, 18 experts in several TESOL related areas were chosen and assigned as moderators to the different forums in the website. So far, a total number of 270 members have registered and used the website in one way or another, either by joining or moderating discussions, uploading or downloading materials, and/or reviewing presentations and discussing them. Also, 27 threaded discussions (topics) were posted in TACON's specialized forums with more than 147 comments on several of them. Some users found it a good venue for sharing queries they may have about the conference (e.g., how to register, where to find the conference schedule, how to contact certain presenters, inviting others to their presentations on certain days of the face-to-face conference, etc.). Overall, the website received 2260 visits for 16537 Volume 18
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pages with 1061 unique visitors and 67728 hits. Those users came from over 25 different countries (see Appendix). Interestingly the TACON Online conferences came along with several serious global issues that happened around the world. In 2010, two major threats occurred that prevented thousands of people from traveling to other countries or participating in several professional events. These two threats were the spread of the H1N1 virus and the economic recession. In 2011, a few weeks before the conference, several revolutions and political unrest hit several Arab countries which, for example, forced several Egyptian presenters and delegates to cancel their participation at the last minute. Many of these same people were happy to be part of the online conference community so that they could still find out a lot about TACON.
Challenges 1. Since this virtual experience represents a totally new experience for many educators in this part of the world, we tried to simplify the experience for delegates and users as much as we could. 2. Like all types of technologies, the more we got involved in this experience the more we thought of introducing new services and/or witnessed new technical challenges. However, these challenges represented good learning points and a professional experience for all who were involved which is the core spirit of TESOL Arabia as a non-profit professional development organization. 3. Several registered users were reluctant to participate particularly in the first year. Major progress has been made so far on that respect, but it is relatively slower and smaller in scale if compared to international conferences in other regions around the world (e.g., TESOL, IATEFL, etc.). 4. Some moderators were not fully comfortable moderating an online discussion. However, most of them were able to help and engage participants in professional discussions based on their different contexts. 5. Due to several technical and other concerns from some presenters, we were not able to introduce a video streaming component to the website.
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Conclusions and Recommendations Due to the infancy of such attempts in the Middle East, this project can be rightly considered to be a successful one. The goals that were set for the website, as explained above, were successfully met without any serious complications or problems. As Fayed (2010) argues, it is the participants’ own decision to continue using the online portal after the actual conference that determines how long this virtual community may transform it into an ongoing community of practice. On a scale of four, Fayed (2010) classifies online communities and CoP into four categories. We believe that this initiative falls under the third category “short-term & periodical” but hope it may evolve to reach category one, “ongoing.” We also recommend that TACON Online be promoted in all possible ways through TA publications, listserv and workshops so participants in the UAE in particular are more aware of its settings and structure early enough before the conference. Setting up short workshops or tutorial sessions/videos before the conference can ensure the ease of use of such online communities. It can also help to require all registered conference members to sign up for an account on the website, which will in turn promote the website and encourage members to try it out.
The TACON Online 2011 website attracted 270 members.
Appendix Top Hits & 25 countries visiting the website
Last visit
22 Mar 2011 - 12:05 a.m. Unique Number of visitors visits
Viewed 1061 traffic
Pages
Hits
Bandwidth
2260
16537
67728
525.84 MB
(2.13 visits/visitor)
(7.31 Pages/ Visit)
(29.96 Hits/ Visit)
(238.25 KB/ Visit)
18395
27090
Not viewed traffic
359.45 MB
References Fayed, I. (2010). Sustaining teacher education programs through online communities of practice. In M. Al-Hamly, P. Davidson, & I. Fayed (Eds.), Computers in English language teaching. Dubai, UAE: TESOL Arabia Publications. Kim, A.J. (2000). Community building on the web: Secret strategies for successful online communities. Berkeley, CA: Peachpit Press. Preece, J., & Maloney-Krichmar, D. (2003). Online communities. In J. Jacko & A. Sears (Eds.), Handbook of human-computer interaction (pp. 596620). Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates Inc. Rheingold, H. (1994). A slice of life in my virtual community. In L. M. Harasim (Ed.), Global networks: Computers and international communication (pp. 57-80). Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.
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The 2nd TESOL Arabia, TESOL International and Franklin SpellEvent Sufian Abu-Rmaileh, TESOL Arabia Past President/SpellEvent Chair On Saturday April 23, 2011, twenty-two students and six teachers from five schools set out at 6:00 a.m. from Al Ain to Dubai. Their sole objective was to participate in the 2nd TESOL Arabia, TESOL International and Franklin SpellEvent. The students had practiced for months in preparation for the event. The event, which took place at Dubai’s Men College in Academic City, Dubai, was organized by TESOL International and Franklin International Publishers and was the third annual event of its kind. This competition is a global spelling competition for nonnative English speaking students who are under the age of 15. The goal of the competition is to promote the learning of English as a Foreign Language. The five participating schools were Al Qattara School for Basic Learning, Al Hadarah School, Al Murijieb Secondary School, Al Dahma Model School, and Al Tamayuz Model School.
The top four finishers, Ahmed Mohammed Al Aryani (1st), Eman Duhail Al Ameri (2nd), Mohammed Yussef Mohammed Al Shamsi (3rd), and Mirhan Maher Abdul Razeq (4th), show off their prizes.
14 other countries, Argentina, Brazil, Chile, China, Czech Republic, France, Germany, Italy, Mexico, Russia, Senegal, Spain, South Korea, and Turkey in the competition. The champion of the international SpellEvent will win a $10,000 scholarship to use towards his or her education. The three other top finishers in the competition were Eman Duhail Al Ameri (2nd), Mohammed Yussef Mohammed Al Shamsi (3rd), and Mirhan Maher Abdul Razeq (4th). TESOL Arabia’s participation in the Franklin Global SpellEvent is part of our commitment to include public school students and teachers by providing them local and international opportunities to develop language learning. Our young students are the most valued of our population.
First Place Winner, Ahmed Mohammed Al Aryani, poses with Maritza Lorge, Franklin Publishers, and TESOL Arabia Past President, Sufian Abu-Rmaileh.
In the last round of the competition, Ahmed Mohammed Al Aryani from Al Tamayuz Model School was announced as the first prize winner, to become the top UAE champion. Ahmed’s prize will be a trip to the world championship SpellEvent in New York City, New York, USA in August. Ahmed and one of his guardians will receive an all-expense paid trip for three days to participate in this international competition. He will join winners from
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The competition, which is for students under the age of 15, targets students who are in the local schools of the country. The language of instruction in the schools should be the local language with a maximum of three subjects taught in English, the regular English class and two other subjects taught in English. The language of communication used in the home should not be English. TESOL Arabia is keeping the tradition of the SpellEvent and continues to build on the benefits of such events for the community.To participate in next year’s SpellEvent or seek information about it, you can e-mail Sufian Abu-Rmaileh at sufian12000@yahoo.com. TESOL Arabia Perspectives
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News from the Leadership and Management SIG Christine Coombe & Phil Quirke
TESOL Arabia’s Leadership and Management SIG started out 2011 with the 3rd Annual Teacher Leadership Academy which took place at Dubai Men’s College on February 10. Plenary speakers, Drs Dudley Reynolds and Neil Anderson shared their perspectives on leadership in ELT with approximately 150 attendees. Prior to the TLA, organizers put on two-days of specialized training for 50 Iranian teachers in personal and professional development. Both of these events featured over 25 concurrent sessions. Dr Chuck Sandy delivered the LM SIG featured speech at the TESOL Arabia Conference on March 11. On March 5 Chuck Sandy, Christine Coombe and Sufian Abu-Rmaileh offered a half-day workshop on teaching effectiveness in conjunction with the Al Ain chapter.
The TESOL Arabia Conference also saw the launch of the LM SIG edited volume entitled Leadership and Management in English Language Teaching. This volume, edited by Christine Coombe, Lauren Stephenson and Sufian Abu-Rmaileh, featured 22 articles from worldwide and locally-based experts in the field. The articles are divided into five sections which include: Theory on Leadership and Management, Research on Leadership and Leadership Perspectives, Professional Development and Leadership, Skills, ◆
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Dr Christine Coombe, Co-chair of the LM SIG, is running a six month online leadership course for 60 teachers from the Gulf. This course which features Drs Neil Anderson and Lauren Stephenson as course facilitators is sponsored by the US Department of State. The LM SIG welcomes Dr Lauren Stephenson to the SIG Executive Committee as co-chair of the LM SIG. Dr Stephenson has a doctorate in Educational Leadership and is an Associate Professor at Zayed University. ❉
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BECOME A QUALIFIED TEACHER THROUGH ECAE
Emirates College for Advanced Education (ECAE), the first Teachers¹ Training College in the UAE, is based in Abu Dhabi city. The college was created in 2007 by H.H. Sheikh Khalifa bin Zayed Al Nahyan and the inspired vision of His Highness Sheikh Mohammad Bin Zayed Al Nahyan, to provide world-class teacher education and to train the next generation of teachers for Abu Dhabi and the UAE.
Drs Christine Coombe and Neil Anderson display the latest issue of Toastmaster at the 3rd Annual Teacher Leadership Academy held at Dubai Men’s College.
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Strategies and Tools for Leadership Development, and Leadership and Technology.
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ECAE is a partner college of the Abu Dhabi Education Council (ADEC) and currently offers a four-year Bachelor of Education degree at the Cycle 1 level (K-5), training Emirati and qualified expatriate students to teach in a range of subjects including English, math and science. For those Emirati students who have not yet fulfilled the Bachelor Education program requirements, ECAE offers a one-year Foundation Program. The college is also involved with English training for in-service teachers and principals and also offers a range of professional development courses for teachers and principals.
Inspire. Empower. Teach. www.ecae.ac.ae
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TESOL Arabia Testing SIG Continues Its Outreach Initiatives Christine Coombe & Peter Davidson
Dr Christine Coombe poses with the participants of the Fundamentals of Assessment Workshop held in Tbilisi, Georgia.
Presenter Konrad Cedro, Dubai Men’s College, and TAE Co-chair, Peter Davidson, Zayed University, enjoy Tbilisi.
The TESOL Arabia Testing, Assessment and Evaluation (TAE) SIG continues to provide assessment training to local members but has stepped up its international outreach initiatives. Thanks to a grant from Educational Testing Services,TAE SIG co-chairs, Dr Christine Coombe and Peter Davidson along with TAE SIG Education Programs Coordinator, Konrad Cedro, travelled to Tbilisi, Georgia, for a one-day “Fundamentals of Language Assessment” (FLA) Conference which took place on January 29, 2011. Forty teachers from all levels of the educational spectrum attended the event.
certificate course. The final course of the academic year was run May 11-13, 2011 at Dubai Men’s College. Dr Barry O’Sullivan delivered the TAE SIG featured speech at the TESOL Arabia Conference where he spoke about current and historical perspectives on language assessment. In August 2011 TAE SIG co-chairs will offer an FLA Conference in Santiago, Chile. ❉
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In early January, TAE SIG cochair, Dr Coombe delivered the coursework for the IELTS Teacher Preparation Certificate. This certificate program was developed by the TAE SIG Education Advisory Committee and features three-days of coursework, a final project and a final exam. Fifty teachers attended the course which was facilitated by Dr Coombe, Ramin Akbari, Konrad Cedro, John Cahill, Hinemoa Xhori, Nickie Christensen and Peter Davidson. So far 95 teachers have undergone the training for this
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TESOL Arabia Special Interest Groups English for Special Purposes SIG Phone: 02 644 0339 Email: esptesolarabia@gmail.com
Saad Rabia Chair
Fathi Bin Mohamed Co-Chair
Najaat Saadi Hezber Co-Chair
Sandra Zaher Co-Chair
Leadership & Management SIG
Literature, Literacy & Language Arts SIG
Phone: 050 619 4796 Email: christine.coombe@hct.ac.ae
Phone: 050 527 7685 Email: tarabialit@gmail.com
Phone: 050 813 3148 Email: pquirke@hct.ac.ae Dr Christine Coombe Co-Chair
Hala El Muniawai Teamleader
Phil Quirke Co-Chair
Teacher Training & Teacher Development SIG Radhika O’Sullivan, Liaison Officer British University in Dubai, Email: Radhika.osullivan@buid.ac.ae
Dr. Marion Engin, Newsletter Editor Zayed University, Dubai, Email: Marion.engin@zu.ac.ae
Helen Donaghue, SIG Coordinator Sharjah Higher Colleges of Technology, Email: hdonaghue@hct.ac.ae
Mary Mayall, Treasurer British University in Dubai, Email: Mary.mayall@buid.ac.ae
Radhika O’Sullivan Dr. Marion Engin
Helen Donaghue
Virginia Robson
Patricia Valiant
Mary Mayall
Learner Independence SIG Email: tailearn@yahoo.com Website: http://ilearn.20m.com
Amr El Zarka
Testing, Assessment & Evaluation SIG
Young Learners SIG
Phone: 050 619 4796 Email: christine.coombe@hct.ac.ae
Phone: 050 322 0697 Email: tarabiayl@gmail.com Website: www.yl-sig.com
Phone: 050 843 8782 Email: peter.davidson@zu.ac.ae Dr Christine Coombe Co-Chair
Peter Davidson Co-Chair
Dr Fiodhna Gardiner-Hyland Chair
Educational Technology SIG Email: edtechsig@gmail.com Ning: http://taedtech.ning.com edtecharabia.twitter.com #taedtech James Buckingham
Cindy Gunn
Vance Stephens
Research SIG Phone: 050 780 3988 Email: amelki22@yahoo.com researchsig22@gmail.com
Mohammad Azaza Azzedddine Bencherab Anouar Bennani Chair Secretary Treasurer Volume 18
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Chapter Reports
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Al Ain Chapter Report Mouhammad Mouhanna
students encountered in their language learning were especially interesting. He highlighted the necessity for teachers to resist correcting students’ language errors and to give students ample opportunities for self or peer correction which have been proven by research to be most effective. At the end of the workshop, I, along with most of the other attendees, left the workshop with a clearer understanding of what LCI actually entailed and how we could practically implement it in our classrooms.
On December 14, 2010, Dr Ali Shehadeh from the United Arab Emirates University’s Applied Linguistics faculty facilitated an insightful and practical workshop as part of TESOL Arabia’s Al Ain Chapter initiatives. This two-hour PD event was entitled, “Learner-Centred Instruction (LCI): What, Why and How?” It was attended by over 40 EFL practitioners from a number of educational institutions based in Al Ain. Dr Shehadeh’s workshop focused on LCI, what it entailed and how it could be implemented in the classroom. Throughout his workshop, Dr Shehadeh successfully weaved theoretical insights, extensive research findings as well as teacher discussions and feedback about LCI. Dr Shehadeh provided a range of evidence from second/foreign language teaching methodology in support of LCI. He focused on Second Language Acquisition Theory in particular, where he drew on the work of Ellis, Krashen and his own published research, amongst others. Attendees were given many opportunities to discuss questions concerning LCI in smaller groups and insights were then shared during whole group discussions. Dr Shehadeh’s descriptions and analyses of the various forms of feedback on language errors that ❉
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Dr Ali Shehadeh addressing those who attended his workshop on LCI.
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Interested in doing research? Need funding? Apply now for a TESOL Arabia Research Grant. Details available at: http://www.tesolarabia.org/grants/Research_Grant_Guidelines_2009.pdf
Contact Peter Davidson at peter.davidson@zu.ac.ae Volume 18
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Chapter Represenatives
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TESOL Arabia Chapter Representatives Abu Dhabi Representative Mohammad Azaza ADNOC Technical Institute Abu Dhabi, UAE 050 780 3988 (mobile) amelki22@yahoo.com
Al Ain Representative Mouhamad Mouhanna UGRU United Arab Emirates University P. O. Box 17172, Al Ain United Arab Emirates 055 959-2547 (mobile) mmouhanna@gmail.com
Sharjah Representative Mona El Samaty University of Sharjah College of Arts English Department P. O. Box 27272, Sharjah, UAE 06 505 3349 (office) monaelsamaty@gmail.com
Dubai Representative Rehab Rejab Institute of Applied Technology P. O. Box 124354 Dubai, United Arab Emirates 050 637 5957 (mobile) rehabrajab@yahoo.com
RAK Representative Anna Bailey Ras Al Khaimah Women’s College Higher Colleges of Technology P. O. Box 4792, Ras Al Khaimah, UAE 07 202 5230 (office) anna.bailey@hct.ac.ae, rakrep@yahoo.co.uk
Eastern Region Representative Sally McQuinn Fujairah Women’s College, HCT P.O. Box 1626, Fujairah, UAE 056 120 9055 (mobile) smcquinn@hct.ac.ae
Western Region Representative Position Vacant! If interested, contact Les Kirkham at leskirkham@gmail.com or Sandra Oddy at sandra.oddy@hct.ac.ae
Volume 18
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Executive Council
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TESOL Arabia Executive Council President/Membership Secretary
Past President
Les Kirkham c/o Al Ain Women’s College Higher College of Technology P. O. Box 17258, Al Ain, UAE leskirkham@gmail.com
Sufian Abu Rmaileh UAE University - UGRU P. O. Box 17172 Al Ain, UAE 03 706 4562 (res) 050 713 1803 (mobile) sabu-rmaileh@uaeu.ac.ae
President Elect
Executive Treasurer
James McDonald Academic Bridge Program Zayed University Dubai, UAE 04 402 1371 (office) james.mcdonald@zu.ac.ae
Deborah Wilson American University of Sharjah P. O. Box 26666 Sharjah, UAE 06 515 2644 (office) deborahewilson@gmail.com
Conference Treasurer
Member-at-Large
Beth Wiens Zayed University P. O. Box 19282, Dubai, UAE 04 402 1350 (office) 04 402 1003 (fax) 050 4620566 (mobile) beth.wiens@zu.ac.ae
Sandra Oddy Al Ain Women's College Higher Colleges of Technology P. O. Box 17258 Al Ain, UAE 03 709 5319 (office) Sandra.Oddy@hct.ac.ae
Executive Secretary/Webmaster
SIG Coordinator
Konrad A Cedro Dubai Men's College Dubai, UAE 050 144 7680 (mobile) konard.cedro@hct.ac.ae
Heather Maria Baba Abu Dhabi Men's College Higher Colleges of Technology P. O. Box 25035 Abu Dhabi, UAE tasigscoord@yahoo.co.uk
Editor - Perspectives
Conference Proceedings Editor / Publications Coordinator
Melanie Gobert Abu Dhabi Men's College Higher Colleges of Technology P. O. Box 25035 Abu Dhabi, UAE mgobert@hct.ac.ae
Peter Davidson Zayed University Dubai, UAE 050 843 8782 (mobile) peter.davidson@zu.ac.ae
www.tesolarabia.org
Volume 18
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No. 2
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June 2011
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TESOL Arabia Perspectives
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www.tesolarabia.org