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Using Migrants’ Stories and Narratives in Teaching Arabic as a Foreign Language
Abstract
When employed creatively and adequately in the classroom, storytelling can be a powerful pedagogical tool that one can use to enhance learning opportunities and communicative competence of students of foreign languages. A growing body of literature suggests that using storytelling in teaching foreign languages provides several valuable outcomes, including helping students to understand and appreciate other cultures other than their own. However, in the context of teaching Arabic as a Foreign Language (AFL) these outcomes still present several challenges mainly the divide between Fusha (standard) and Ammiya/Darija (colloquial). Another challenge is the identification and selection of story-based teaching materials that suit the learners’ needs and the curriculum used for teaching. This paper addresses these discrepancies by investigating the attitudes of AFL learners towards an integrated approach in acquiring a contextualized communicative and cultural competence via migration stories, and virtual encounters with migrants and refugees from Tunisia/Sicily. My goal through this study is to assess the effectiveness of migration stories as authentic human experiences in augmenting students’ learning motivations towards a holistic Arabic language acquisition and cultural competence proficiency.
Discipline
Anthropology
Geographic Area
All Middle East
Sub Area
None