Abstract

The teaching of cultural content in the foreign language classroom has received a great deal of attention throughout the past few decades. The role of culture in the L2 classroom has been investigated and studied from different perspectives. This study investigates teachers' perceptions of teaching culture in the Arabic as a foreign language novice classroom, in addition to how Arabic as foreign language teachers introduce and assess culture. The aim of this study is to explore the current teaching practices regarding cultural content in the novice classroom, in order to determine what is needed for better teaching practices that can improve the Arabic as a foreign language learner's intercultural communicative competence. The data collected for this study consisted of an online questionnaire, observations of Arabic as a foreign language novice classroom, and teachers' interviews. Qualitative and quantitative analysis of the findings revealed that Arabic as foreign language teachers have positive perceptions about teaching culture in the novice classroom. Although they consider teaching culture to be as important as teaching language, they use relatively few techniques for introducing culture such as culture notes, tasks and projects. For cultural resources, they rely mainly on the textbook cultural content or the spontaneous cultural content. Moreover, there are many challenges that affect teaching culture at the novice level, such as the availability of ready-made cultural content and activities, and also the time factor. In regard to assessing culture, however, while Arabic as foreign language teachers do assess the language use appropriateness, they struggle in assessing the cultural perspectives, and they have limited techniques for assessing cultural knowledge.

Department

Applied Linguistics Department

Degree Name

MA in Teaching Arabic as a Foreign Language

Graduation Date

2-1-2019

Submission Date

January 2019

First Advisor

Abo El Seoud, Dalal

Committee Member 1

Hassan, Mona Kamel

Committee Member 2

Abdou, Ashraf

Extent

107 p.

Document Type

Master's Thesis

Rights

The author retains all rights with regard to copyright. The author certifies that written permission from the owner(s) of third-party copyrighted matter included in the thesis, dissertation, paper, or record of study has been obtained. The author further certifies that IRB approval has been obtained for this thesis, or that IRB approval is not necessary for this thesis. Insofar as this thesis, dissertation, paper, or record of study is an educational record as defined in the Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act (FERPA) (20 USC 1232g), the author has granted consent to disclosure of it to anyone who requests a copy.

Institutional Review Board (IRB) Approval

Approval has been obtained for this item

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