How to Make Learning more Interesting

1. How to Make Learning more Interesting Markos Awdalla

2. Quotations • “Learning without thought is labor lost; thought without learning is perilous.” Confucius. • “Do you remember your first week of classes? There were so many new buildings and peoples' names to remember. And you had to recall accurately this information. What a stressful time we experienced when we came to school, the challenge was learning and memorizing. They were two techniques we used to lean with”Rita Smilkstein How to Make Learning more Interesting ICELW 2010 June 9th-11th, New York, NY, USA

3. Introduction • It is very clear that we can not always depend on technology in education. We need to think about what we can use students’ skills. This looks strange to be written by an Education Technologist. But this is a fact, when we always depend on technology; we forget technology is a tool we might use or not Through this paper there will be a new case about how to make learning more fun for non school organizations. How to Make Learning more Interesting ICELW 2010 June 9th-11th, New York, NY, USA

4. HOW TO MAKE LEARNING interesting • When we talk about learning, we are always thinking about school programs. This is right but there are others ways of learning. What about thinking of non-profit organizations or centers; since September 2008, I have been doing volunteer work at St. George and St. Joseph Coptic church, Montreal. This type of volunteer work focuses on teaching children the Arabic Language. How to Make Learning more Interesting ICELW 2010 June 9th-11th, New York, NY, USA

5. The Program • Basically we have two classes right now in our church an elementary and an intermediate level; usually we start by the end of Sept. and continue to May every year. As I wrote earlier that there were some problems; when I demonstrated this year’s curriculum, I tried to avoid last year’s problems; as well I enrolled in teaching and administration responsibility How to Make Learning more Interesting ICELW 2010 June 9th-11th, New York, NY, USA

6. 1St Level • I worked to modify and edit the program for the elementary level based on learning letters. I started with learning letters one by one and phonetics. It is known, that the Arabic language is very complicated with its letters and phonetics; there are three actions for every letter - at the beginning, in the middle and at the end of the word. Children should be focused on how these letters and phonetics are written and pronounced during the first term. Then by the second term I think they will be able to manage to figure out short words up to four letters How to Make Learning more Interesting ICELW 2010 June 9th-11th, New York, NY, USA

7. 2nd Level • The intermediate level knew the Alphabet letters last year, so I tried to focus on reading and practicing the language. Thus, by the end of this level they will be able to read and write short phrases. As well, they will be able to pronounce simple words up to 5 letters; in addition, they will have to learn about weather and try to define the four seasons. They learned the deference between A.M and P.M hours systems  last year, but they did not practice using it in their conversations. In the new curriculum they should be able to describe different types of professional careers, services or general works How to Make Learning more Interesting ICELW 2010 June 9th-11th, New York, NY, USA

8. Activities • There are more activities for both classes such as an audio CD with some hums in Arabic, and through these audio tracks they practice listening. Recently, I found some cartoon movies  in Arabic, so every two weeks all the children and -teachers- watch  the movie  together for two reasons. First, the children need to have fun and  have  a friendly relationship with the teachers. Second, the teachers make sure that they have understood the movie and are able to describe movie in their own words How to Make Learning more Interesting ICELW 2010 June 9th-11th, New York, NY, USA

9. Achievements of this program • This program run by volunteers can help the community to focus on how children can improve learning skills; it can be applied in non-profitable organizations which are working to develop children’s skills. • As well, children become able to think about using their skills and abilities to learn the Arabic Language. It is hard to recognize letters through imagining alone; however, the new program helped children to play with clay so that they could become familiar with letters in ways other than the usual old style of writing on the board. How to Make Learning more Interesting ICELW 2010 June 9th-11th, New York, NY, USA

10. Conclusion • In conclusion, this program focuses on learning language; and it can be useful to non- profit organizations or even for the regular educational system; I think this program could help children to be involved at an early education level, since new immigrants and students now have some learning difficulties. From my point of view as an education technologist we cannot ignore students’ and children’s skills; because if we use and depend always on technology, we will have generations who cannot think or take a step forward on their own. For example nowadays many teenagers make a lot of grammar and vocabulary mistakes. The reason for this is the use of texting, e-mail language and auto corrections; however, we can utilize ICT as a tool in the education process, but we should always be aware of how, when, and where we should use ICT in education. How to Make Learning more Interesting ICELW 2010 June 9th-11th, New York, NY, USA

11. Acknowledgment • I would like to thank everyone who has been working with me in this project. First of all, I would like to thank our Fathers who gave me the chance to act as responsible for this activity, as well as Ms. Patricia and Mr. Nader Rizk. I'm really proud of what the children did thought this program and I hope to keep working on this program for next years as a teacher or an education technologist. • I would like to thank Ms. Susan Jean Lebrun for what she did last year as she worked on last year paper as an editor. I'm really appreciating her efforts. In addition, Ms. Maureen Tinsley. How to Make Learning more Interesting ICELW 2010 June 9th-11th, New York, NY, USA