The study investigated college students’ attitudes towards the teaching and learning of English and Arabic, towards using English and Arabic as a medium of instruction at the university level, and the types of educational reforms that need to be carried out in the light of their responses. Findings of interviews and questionnaires administered to a sample of students at Jordan University and King Saud University showed that 45% of the subjects prefer to educate their children at an international school where they can learn all the subjects in English at a very young age. 96% of the students at Jordan University and 82% of the subjects at king Saud University believe that Arabic can be used as a medium of instruction in religion, history, Arabic literature and education, whereas English is more appropriate for teaching medicine, pharmacy, engineering, science, nursing, and computer science. Findings indicated that the students are more keen on teaching their children English than Arabic. They consider English a superior language, being an international language, and the language of science and technology, research, electronic databases, technical terminology, dictionaries, and teaching methodology. They gave many educational, vocational, technological, social reasons for favoring the English language. The study concluded that Arabic is facing a serious threat by the expansion of English language in all walks of life, lack of language planning, linguistic policies that protect, revive and develop the Arabic language, inadequate Arabicization processes in the Arab world, inadequate number of technical books translated and published in Arabic, misconceptions among college students about first and second language acquisition by children and adults, and about the language of instruction at medical and technological colleges around the world.
Prof. Reima Al-jarf
King Saud University
Riyadh, Saudi Arabia
http://faculty.ksu.edu.sa/aljarf
Bookmark/Search this post with:
