STUDIES IN ARABIC TEACHING AND LEARNING
Year:2017 | Volume:1 | Issue:1 |Papers Count:6

Exams have a fundamental role in the teaching and learning process and are considered as one of the most significant applied tools in the teaching process to assess learners’ capabilities and to measure their success level. They provide useful information to determine the students’ efficiency and competency levels and to help the educators to enhance the educational circumstances. Therefore, preparing exam questions based on a desirable method is regarded as the most significant task that need to be attended by the teachers, and if this task is fulfilled successfully, then the questions can be considered as an appropriate tool to attain target objectives. The present study has attempted to examine the Arabic final exam questions of junior high school third grade in humanities and science and mathematics fields in the educational year 2015-2016 based on Bloom’s 6-level taxonomy in cognitive domain. The purpose of the study was to find to what extent the final exam questions were consistent with the objectives based on which the Arabic book has been compiled. The study applied a descriptive-analytic method. The research tool of the study was based on Bloom’s 6-level taxonomy in cognitive domain. The statistical population and the sample of the study were the same, both containing Arabic final exam questions of junior high school third grade in humanities and science and mathematics fields in the educational year 2015-2016, the questions were analyzed using frequency and percentage statistical methods. The findings revealed that the designers of the Arabic final exam questions of junior high school third grade in the educational year 2015-2016 have greatly focused on lower levels of cognitive domain like comprehension and application and their focus on higher levels of cognitive domain like analysis, synthesis and evaluation has been very low. It was also concluded that these questions do not help to enhance and grow students’ mental skills.

The role of second language as a means of communication cannot be denied. Therefore, attempt is made to teach second languages on the basis of people›s abilities from the first steps of teaching a second language. Considering this, the present study investigated the role of gender in learning the four language skills of Arabic. There are different views about the effect of gender on second language learning. The four language skills of listening, speaking, reading and writing and the way they are taught to the learners have been the main issue in second language teaching era till now. The purpose of this study was to find the effect of gender on learning Arabic four skills. To this aim, hypotheses were tested through scientific comparative method and t-test. Purposeful sampling was used for collecting data from 100 male and female students of Imam Sadiq University. The students were investigated by a questionnaire having 40 questions on lingual disorders in four skills of listening, speaking, reading and writing. Results of the study showed that there was a significant difference in terms of their performance in the four language skills between male and female students. The speaking skill of girls was 25 percent better than that of boys, and boys› performance was 45 percent more than that of girls. There was, however, no significant difference between the mean of listening and writing skills of boys and girls.

Since teaching a language –as one of the most important courses in the educational system- is a crucial task, it is absolutely necessary to study language pedagogy which can direct students toward intended targets, and eliminate educational barriers. Educational scholars believe that one of the most necessary elements for learning a language is the textbook, but unfortunately students are not willing to learn Arabic these days, and due to the students increasing reluctance, most of Arabic teachers and educationists attempt to increase the attractiveness of Arabic language courses so as to boost the students’ motivation to learn the Holy Quran language. The purpose of this article is to analyze the strong and weak points of the Arabic humanities textbook of the third grade of high school. The paper is based on an experimental descriptive analytical study which considers texts, exercises and translation parts of the textbook. According to the article results, the authors found that there was no special attention to teaching Arabic as the second language, and there was a long way to reach its satisfying level. In this regard, making drastic changes, in various educational parts, and educational cooperation are needed. One of the most practical solutions to improve this situation is to promote Arabic language teachers’ knowledge level and utilize new educational techniques.

“Arabic between your Hands” is one of the most important series of teaching Arabic language to Non-Arabs, which is widely known in the area of teaching Arabic language. The aim of this study was to investigate the basis of these series by analyzing the advantages and disadvantages, and also assessing their limitations in meeting the needs of Iranian learners. The methodology was as follows. First, the researcher gathered the criteria of compiling a book and designing the content of teaching a foreign language; then, he analyzed these series based on the syllabus type, the method of presenting the verbal elements (vocabulary, sounds, and grammar), the four skills, and culture. Moreover, in order to analyze the advantages and disadvantages, some other general criteria, such as form features, exercise variation, gradation of vocabulary, conversations and verbal structures were also analyzed. The results of the study indicated that in the first part, the syllabus was presented based on the role syllabus and in the second and third parts, it was presented based on the thematic syllabus. Conversations had close answers in the first part while they had open but guided answers in the second part and completely open and free answers in the third part. Presenting the vocabulary from sensory to abstract, having two by two exercises and presenting the conversations in different situations were some of the advantages of the series. To talk about the disadvantages, limiting the Arabic culture to religious culture and lack of appropriate exercises for group conversations were notable. Also, the vocabulary and texts in the first part of the series were not proportional to Iranian’s language ability.

Rhetoric has been one of the most important courses in Arabic literature and language teaching which has drawn the attention of experts since a long time ago, and that is because rhetoric shows inimitability of the Quran and discovers the beauty of poems and prose and strengthens educational literary interest. Thus, we should use advanced teaching strategies which motivate the students and help them to increase their creativity and innovation skills, help them to have experts' literary interest, and to discover the beauties of Quran or literary writings. To this aim, in this study, using descriptive-analytic method, survey method, and questionnaire, we tried to find out the extent of using these strategies in teaching Arabic rhetoric in Iran’s state universities. Our purpose was to help teachers to teach this course better and improve students' literary interest skills. The results of this study showed that although teachers mentioned that they occasionally used the most important teaching strategies such as speech strategy, discussion, problem solving, brainstorming, and cooperative learning, students maintained that teachers rarely used these strategies.

Learning the grammar of a language is undoubtedly a prerequisite to learning that language. Grammar is one of the most important subjects in the Arabic language departments of Iranian universities. When we are talking with Iranian students in the Arabic language department, we realize that they are suffering from weak language skills, especially regarding the application of the grammar of the Arabic language. When reviewing subjects, we see that there are a lot of subjects in this area without which they cannot speak or write Arabic using these grammars. At the beginning of this article, we want to disclose the reasons for this weakness, and then offer solutions to alleviate some of these problems. Failure to follow the teaching of Arabic to non-native speakers of Iranian universities was one of the problems found. Furthermore, the books taught at Iranian universities are the same books written for Arab students. New books need to be written for Iranian students who are non-native speakers of Arabic language and the teaching of practical rules rather than the theoretical bases is also recommended.