Transforming Education in the Gulf Region

Emerging Learning Technologies and Innovative Pedagogy for the 21st Century

Khalid Alshahrani, Mohamed Ally

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2016
• Print ISBN:
  9781138657007
• eBook ISBN:
  9781317220381
• Topic: Education
• Subtopic: Education General

Countries in the Arab Gulf are currently experiencing some of the fastest rates of growth and progress in the world. Transforming Education in the Gulf Region argues that education systems in these countries need to use innovative pedagogies and best practices in teaching and learning to educate all citizens so that they obtain the knowledge and skills to be productive members of society. This book will contribute to the transformation of education in the Gulf countries by suggesting best practices, research outcomes and case studies from experts in the Gulf region.

It has become increasingly evident in recent years that Gulf countries need to use emerging learning technologies to cater for the needs of learners and to provide maximum flexibility in learning. There is also a growing practical need to use electronic technologies, since learning materials are more widely available in electronic formats than in paper-based formats. This book focuses on the role of emerging technologies and innovative pedagogies in transforming education in six Gulf countries in the region (Saudi Arabia, United Arab Emirates, Kuwait, Qatar, Oman and Bahrain). With contributions from experts around the world, the book argues that the time is right for Arab Gulf countries to make the transition to electronic learning and that they need to implement the outcomes of research and adopt best practices to transform and revolutionize education to prepare learners in the Gulf region for the 21st Century.

The book should be of interest to academics and students in the areas of higher education, learning technologies, education policy and education reform. It should also be of interest to educators and policymakers in the Gulf region.

Part I

Theoretical perspectives

1 Adapting technology-enhanced learning to students’ culture

Faculty perspectives

Rasha Al Okaily

Introduction and context

The United Arab Emirates (UAE) is a cosmopolitan country with a large number of higher education (HE) institutes, both local and international. Universities in the UAE are shaped by cultural complexities in various ways (Findlow, 2006). Government universities accept UAE nationals only, while private universities accept students from the UAE and other nations. This means that each university has its own cultural mix. Faculty in both types of universities, however, are mainly expatriates from around the world. When it comes to English language teaching, the majority of faculty are Westerners or Western educated. The term ‘Westerners’ in the UAE is often used to refer to American, British, Canadian, Australian and European people in general, whether they are natives of these countries or educated in them, and ‘Large-scale importation of Western-trained language teachers to teach in a non-Western educational context poses challenges because teachers and students tend to operate from within their own distinct social, cultural and educational paradigm’ (Diallo, 2014, p. 1).

This study focuses on faculty perceptions in a private university where the majority of students are UAE and Saudi nationals. In this university, men and women study on separate campuses, one for women and one for men. Hence, the prevailing student culture is the Arab, Islamic, conservative. The university policy is rooted in Arabic and Islamic tradition, and the rules, regulations and policies stipulate that all behaviours, activities, dress codes and so on should conform to this culture. This determines instructors’ choice of pedagogy, resources, learning activities, assignment types, classroom activities and ways of interaction. This study explores how the use of technology-enhanced learning (TEL) activities and assignments is affected by such conformity to students’ cultural norms and university policy.

Problem statement

With the integration of technology into teaching and learning, it has been generally noticed that there is unease among some female students with regard to assignments that incorporate online activities, particularly recording speech and publishing to an online forum. This prompted an earlier study (Al Okaily, unpublished) in which the findings showed that some students tended to resist online speaking activities for three main reasons: motivational, technical and cultural. This led to the recommendation of further research into the cultural norms that affect technology integration in teaching and learning and the choice of TEL activities that are acceptable in order to avoid any unnecessary cultural tensions.

This paper investigates the effect of the prevailing cultural norms on TEL with the purpose of contributing to the body of literature that informs expatriate faculty on what TEL practices may or may not be acceptable within the cultural practices of a private university in the UAE.

Culture, globalization and TEL

Studies conducted in some HE institutes in the UAE take a geo-ethnic stance, where language, religion and tradition are seen to shape cultural norms. Findlow (2001) points to the two most apparent characteristics of culture being the Arabic language and the Islamic religion, and Rapanta (2014) uses spirituality as one of the traits through which she analyses cultural practices of students in a government HE institute.

Official documents of the university where this study was conducted also state that the university’s mission and vision are deeply rooted in Arab Islamic culture. However, important ecological factors, such as the fast-paced economic growth and the changing demographics through importation of foreign work force, have been described as affecting national identity and causing ‘cultural fragility’ (Hopkyns, 2014, p.3), ‘cultural tsunami’ (Hatherley-Green, 2014, p.2) or ‘global–local values conflict’ (Findlow, 2001, p.1), leading to challenges in the educational context (Diallo, 2014). To face these challenges, the government is taking various measures to strengthen the national identity and heritage of the UAE (Hopkyns, 2014). This, in turn, led some HE institutions to orient Western faculty about the differences between Western and Middle Eastern cultures in an attempt to avoid what they term cultural pit-falls (Rapanta, 2014).

There are some other factors that play an important role here. English has become a lingua franca in the UAE to facilitate communication between UAE inhabitants, both locals and expatriates (Randal and Samimi, 2010), and is the medium of instruction in most HE college majors. Add to this a persistent call by policy makers for increased technology integration in education in both government and private universities. If we place these factors against the background of the fast economic growth of the UAE, the result is then a society that is being affected by globalization to a high degree. Spring (2008) explains that the two driving forces of globalization are economy and technology. He also refers to, and endorses, Tollefson and Tsui’s (2007) view that technology and English are mediation tools for globalization.

Putting all the above factors together (Figure 1.1), we have a culture that is under two opposing forces. The first is globalization, and the second is government policies to reinforce national identity, heritage and the Arabic language. The push and pull of these forces is resulting in a culture that is constantly changing and in need of continuous reassessment to determine the boundaries between the acceptable and the unacceptable.

Figure 1.1 Factors affecting culture in the UAE.

On the other hand, both institutional policies and cultural norms affect TEL pedagogies and choices. Goodfellow and Lamy (2009) explain that neither online learning technologies nor the pedagogies related to them are culturally neutral and refer to Hannon and D’Netto’s (2005) assertion that institutional needs, structures and strategies play a role in forming the learning experiences of online learning technologies. Dunbar (1991) asserts that technologies carry the characteristics of the countries that developed them, which may cause a cultural mismatch when used with other groups of people with different cultural norms. Al Hunayyan and Al-Sharhan (2009, p. 2) explain this by pointing out that ‘Arab countries have some rich cultures and religious beliefs, which may be violated seriously in the light of the current trends in virtual learning.’. Akinyemi (2003) points to the importance of taking socio-cultural factors into consideration when introducing new technologies and reiterates the possibility of cultural mismatch when incorporating virtual learning. I would like to stress here that, since culture is seen to be dynamic and changing through the effects of globalization, the above cited literature on the culture–technology fit belongs to the time in which the research was conducted and can serve as a pointer to the need for further research into cross-cultural pedagogy to ensure that ‘quality education is delivered in a culturally accessible form’ (Prowse, 2014, p. 1).

Research questions

How do the prevailing cultural norms affect technology integration in a private university in the UAE?

1 How do faculty members perceive and assess students’ culture?

2 How do the students’ cultural norms affect faculty’s choice of TEL activities and assignments?

Methodology and method

This study is qualitative research concerned mainly with faculty perspectives on how prevailing cultural norms influence their technology integration practices. The research paradigm adopted is constructivist (Mackenzie and Knipe, 2006), with hermeneutic phenomenology that aims to give rich descriptions of the experiences of participants (Smith, 1997) in order to ‘get beneath the subjective experience and find the genuine objective nature of things as realised by an individual’ (Kafle, 2013, p. 186). Creswell (2009) notes that phenomenology is both a philosophy and a method because it aims at understanding lived human experiences as described by participants. The notion that the researcher needs to bracket his or her own experience (Creswell, 2009) is challenged here. Being a faculty member in the same university and experiencing the same phenomenon makes the researcher’s views relevant to the study. Flood (2010) proposes the notion of co-constituality, which is the process of meaning making based on a blend of the participants’ as well as the researcher’s views. Therefore, the researcher’s views on technology integration in this particular teaching context are shaped by the same prevailing cultural norms.

Data collection and participants

Although a number of data collection methods are possible, conducting interviews are typically associated with phenomenological studies (Kinnunen and Simon, 2012), hence this was the chosen method of data collection. Semi-structured interviews were conducted with five faculty members who are known within the university for their integration of technology in teaching (a purposive sample). They are either Westerners or Western educated, and comprise one female and four male instructors with experience in the university ranging from two to nine years. The demographic data of the participants are presented in Table 1.1. The researcher tried to prompt participants to give their views and interpretations on areas identified by the researcher as possible cultural pitfalls. Meaning making in this case does not only depend on the participants’ experience, but on the researcher’s experience of the same phenomenon in the same learning context.

Table 1.1 Participants’ demographic data

Procedure

The purpose of the interview was explained to the participants and the anonymity of their responses was also assured. Participants consented to audio recording of their interviews. Each interview started with a general plan only (Flood, 2010) and questions were broadly stated to allow the participants to give as rich descriptions as possible. Sub-questions were added – in the form of probes and prompts – when needed and for the purposes of prompting participants to elaborate or clarify. The critical incident analysis technique (Tripp, 1993) was employed to elicit detailed examples from participants. Tripp (1993), as cited in Hamlin (2004), defines this technique as ‘interpretations to the significance of an event’ (p. 171).

Participants were invited to talk about their perspectives on technology integration and culture and to reflect on the link between them. First, they were asked how they integrate technology and what TEL activities or assignments they use with their students. Then they were asked to describe the students’ cultural norms. Later, participants were asked if such norms affected their choice of TEL activities in any way.

The sub-topics ranged between what technologies the interviewees were reluctant to use for cultural reasons, and which TEL activities they had used but later decided not to use again, for similar reasons.

Validity and reliability

There are limited ways to validate qualitative research other than respondent validation (Cohen, Manion and Morrison, 2009). After transcribing the audio-recorded interviews, the script was then shown to the participants for validation. Participants kept their transcripts overnight. They had enough time to read them carefully and decide once more if they were willing to share their views for the purpose of this study. They were reassured regarding the anonymity of their responses, and they confirmed that the transcripts were a true account of the interview.

Subjectivity may still be an issue here, since the selection and interpretation of data can be influenced by the researcher’s own views being immersed in the same context as the respondents’. Cohen et al. (2009) explain this:

there is a risk that, since data and interpretation are unavoidably combined (the double hermeneutic), the subjective views of the researcher might lead to him or her being overselective, unrepresentative and unfair to the situation in hand in the choice of data and the interpretation placed on them.

(p. 540)

Therefore, avoidance of being overselective is attempted here, as is representation of all relevant views. The comments that were not directly related to the research questions, such as conversational digressions, were the only ones not inclu...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Table of Contents
• List of contributors
• Foreword
• Preface
• Acknowledgements
• PART I Theoretical perspectives
• PART II Practical applications
• PART III The future
• Epilogue: looking to the future
• Glossary
• Index