Adapting Arabic Online

Video still from SISMEC Presents via MENAS
A conversation with Dr. Sonia Shiri of the School of Middle Eastern & North African Studies (MENAS), by Brandon T. Bishop, Student Science Journalist
Students of Arabic need to learn 28 new letters (not counting the vowels) and 10 entirely new sounds, enough to tax the skill of even the most talented language learner. But Dr. Sonia Shiri is working to bring Arabic fluency into the reach of any college student. Shiri, the University of Arizona’s Middle East language programs coordinator, is developing innovative techniques that integrate computers and the Internet into language education. To improve teaching methods, she is also exploring a concept called communication accommodation theory, which describes how people adapt their language use to each other.
What did you do before coming to UA?
In 2010 I wrote a chapter for the book Exploring Linguistic Diversity in the United States. It was a survey of the history of Arabic teaching and learning in the U.S. as well as the retention and loss of Arabic in different communities. My previous work also involved Web-based distance learning. With a grant from the U.S. Department of Education, I developed a distance-learning program for Arabic at the University of California at Berkeley from 2003 to 2008. This program was intended to make Arabic available to students at all ten campuses of the UC system.
How did you make it work?
The program was the first of its kind in Arabic. It wasn’t just a supplement to an existing course. We had to think of every single step so students could stay with you over the course of a semester. We took the best practices from Spanish, Chinese, French and Russian and adapted them for Arabic-language learners. The results were a combination of guided and free learning. We called the course Arabic Without Walls. We used Moodle, an open source program for course management; Wiki, a tool that allows people to author and collaborate on documents at different times or asynchronously; and Wimba, a voice-and-text tool that allows people to do synchronous and asynchronous online chats. With these programs, students were actively learning and enjoying the process.
What are some of the differences between online classes and traditional lectures?
With a computer as both a tutor and a tool, students can engage in authentic, meaningful interactions with native speakers and other learners. They can practice Web-based pronunciation, grammar or vocabulary drills, and they can get multimedia exposure to native speakers’ cultures in an interactive manner. Online learning is more inclusive and naturally supports student-centered learning. It defies time, space and pace constraints typically associated with the face-to-face classroom. It blurs many boundaries and challenges our understanding of roles in the learning environment. When well designed and supported by interaction with teachers, online language learning can be as effective as face-to-face learning, even with languages such as Arabic.
Are you still developing online language classes?
Since 2009, I’ve integrated this online course and other Web-based materials that I designed in the curriculum of the Department of State-funded Critical Language Scholarship Program. This national program offers intensive study aboard scholarships in summer for students from all over the U.S. Students in this program used these online and computer-based materials in institutes in Morocco, Tunisia, Egypt, Jordan and Oman. Here at the UA, the Online Education Project has funded our design of a blended course—half face-to-face and half online—on the Levantine dialect of Arabic. Students can do part of the lesson at home and have the chance to interact with an instructor in class. The face-to-face class is already full, but if we introduce a blended format, we can expand access to more students, including ones who are concurrently taking other Arabic classes.
How is a blended class different from a traditional class?
First, a blended class can make learning more fun by letting students interact with several multimedia sources. Second, it introduces flexibility and extends learning outside the classroom. Students can be learning and doing research by using technology outside of class. For example, students can listen to news broadcasts online and then give a presentation on them in class. They can also post their presentation online for others to see or collaboratively create a piece with other learners outside the classroom. A blended class also accelerates learning by encouraging students to spend time with the language—what we call “time on task.” You can send students to find a song by a particular singer as part of an assignment. They’ll find the singer and listen to other songs where they’ll hear words they don’t recognize. They’ll look up the words and learn even more. This student-directed part of the course increases students’ motivation and autonomy. Blended learning combines the best of these two worlds.
How can communication accommodation theory affect student learning?
This theory is very important for communication in the classroom. Teachers have to know how to speak to their students in a productive way. If a teacher begins a course by speaking like a native speaker, students won’t understand. You have to modify your way of speaking as scaffolding to build students’ understanding. One of the teaching techniques I discuss with T.A.s is adapting language so students gain confidence through how you talk with them, adjusting as you go to differences in the students’ current understanding.
One important aspect of Arabic is diglossia—the use of Modern Standard Arabic together with local dialects. How can knowledge of dialects help Arabic-language learners?
Exposure to dialects helps students to tackle the interpersonal and sociolinguistic complexities they’ll encounter when interacting with native speakers from different parts of the Arab world. It helps students understand that millions speak a particular dialect, that there’s a whole culture, a whole history they could tap by learning a dialect. Students can also use knowledge of one dialect to learn another.
Do you find it difficult to encourage students to study a dialect in addition to Modern Standard Arabic?
I don’t have to promote learning a dialect. I just need to show students a clip from the news. The anchors speak in Modern Standard Arabic, but then they go to an interview in Iraq or Syria, and the interviewee responds in a dialect or a mixture of dialect and Modern Standard Arabic. Students then know they have to grapple with dialects. The bar is high for learners of Arabic, but we have to embrace the diglossic nature of this language. By using innovative tools and approaches, we will help our students reach the advanced levels that so many of them now pursue.