�Mohamed Ansary�www.mohamedansary.com � mansary@email.arizona.edu �School of Middle Eastern & North African Studies�The University of Arizona
Using Technology for Increasing Students’ Engagement, Collaboration & Digital Literacy in the Arabic Language Classroom
Background
be replaced by a new tool next year. For example: icq.
�But pedagogical goals and principles hardly change.
Using Technology for Increasing Students’ Engagement,
Collaboration & Multiple Literacies in the Arabic Language Classroom
The 4Cs of the 21st skills : Collaboration, Communication, Critical Thinking & Creativity
What technology-based tools do you use for increasing your students’ engagement,
collaboration, interaction & multiple literacies in your classroom?
Socrative is a student response system that empowers teachers to engage their
classrooms through a series of educational exercises via smartphones, laptops,
and tablets. (www.socrative.com)
Socrative is a student response formative assessment system (SRFAS) that can be used for engagement, collaboration, effectiveness and increasing students’ Digital Literacy.
Go to: www.socrative.com (Or download the app “socrative student”)
Click on [Student Login]
Room Name: ACTFL
Write your real name
Answer the questions at your pace
(Another interactive exercise: Space Race)
The University of Arizona - School of Middle Eastern & North African Studies
Increasing the students’ multiple literacies.
Students are encouraged to use the Arabic Keyboard.
Writing homework for 407 students = 7th semester = 4th year
Working on the paragraph level. Using cohesive devices.
Media class = 8th semester = 4th year
Writing homework for 401 students = 3rd semester
Socrative for the Final Review
Keeping an eye on homework while being done
Space Race = Engagement & Collaboration
Socrative for Listening Drills
N.B. This is how we “create a supportive classroom environment”.
Why Socrative rather than any other tech tool?
Benefits / Pedagogical Implications
1-Providing immediate feedback
2-Taking attendance
3-Increasing the students’ digital literacy (i.e. using the Arabic keyboard)
4-Transforming the students’ homework from the traditional way to an interactive way.
5-Saving all quizzes and tasks for future use
6-Self paced learning
7- Increasing students’ autonomy
8-Visualizing students’ understanding
9- Creating supportive classroom environment
10- Types of learning: Writing - Reading - Listening
“Socrative is the teacher’s friendly, fun, and most effective classroom engagement
app. By utilizing this free and flexible tool, educators of all subject matters are able
to initiate formative and summative assessments in the classroom. Moreover,
by creating content-rich quizzes, bell work, and exit tickets, educators are able to
display instantly the students’ individual/and or team responses followed by feedback
to spark dynamic learning, peer-to-peer communication, team competition, and
problem- solving. I highly recommend using this instantaneous cloud-based platform.”
Nabila Hammami, Ph.D.
Arabic Instructor/World Language Department Head
Dearborn Public Schools
Fordson High School
English Instructor
Henry Ford College
“Socrative is very useful application for a student to make review on the topics that he/she learned. I did not know this application until my Arabic professor Mohamad Ansary introduced it to us in the class last spring. He used this app. to make review, to keep us on the track, to push us to do our homework and to take attendance. Socrative helped a lot improving my Arabic, keep myself updated, and follow the topics since as a student sometimes it sounds tempting to not do homework and not submit your paper daily. Also it makes everything easier for the instructor including taking attendance and answering the questions in the class instead of reading the papers of each student and grading as well as giving feedback.
After I knew this application, I started using it for my own classes. Las semester, I was working as a TA and leading discussion classes of Religion of Islam. I realized that my students participated more, they paid more attention to the class and they had less absences because of Socrative. Also, I got good feedbacks from my students about Socrative. Socrative led them to do weekly review before coming to class because they knew that I prepared small quiz for them.
In short, Socrative provides a good opportunity to learn and teach for students and instructors.”
Atacan Atakan
Ph.D. Student
School of Middle Eastern & North African Studies
The University of Arizona
Testimonials
“After I had been introduced to Socrative in my Arabic class,
I started to use it in my position as a TA in my GenEd classes.
It has proven to be very helpful, especially with regards to getting
immediate feedback on the students' progress.”
Miriam Mayer
Ph.D. Student
School of Middle Eastern & North African Studies
The University of Arizona
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"One of the best aspects of Socrative, besides how easy it was to use,
is that we received instant feedback on our homework so I could correct
any mistakes right away. In addition, I could redo the exercises which allowed
for additional practice to better grasp the grammar concepts and the vocabulary we were using for the exercise.”
Aaron James Graybill
MA Student
School of Middle Eastern & North African Studies
The University of Arizona
“I found Socrative to be a great resource and learning tool in the study of Arabic.
The flexibility of accessing lessons via smartphone or computer at any time is wonderful.
Additionally, our instructor allowed us to access each lesson as many times as we needed
to understand the material which truly made it a learning tool and not just a testing
device. It was also nice to see how we compared (anonymously) with our classmates,
and the comparison allowed our instructor to see the areas in which we collectively
needed more instruction. I think Socrative is a great addition to a learning environment.”
Jennifer LaMoureaux
The School of Middle Eastern & North African Studies
The University of Arizona
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“The Socrative app was an excellent tool for quizzing the students grasp
of the vocabulary informally and frequently. I enjoyed seeing the results
immediately after finishing the activities.”
Anthony McGee
The School of Middle Eastern & North African Studies
The University of Arizona
“The first time I ever used Socrative was for my Arabic class.
As soon as I used it I knew how helpful it was going to be.
Socrative helped me understand my mistakes by giving me instant feedback.
Whenever I would make a mistake I would log out and start all over,
this really helped me. It also saved me a lot of time doing homework.
I really like Socrative and would like more classes to use it.”
Jacqueline Cheang
The School of Middle Eastern & North African Studies
The University of Arizona