THE USE OF COMMUNICATIVE ARABIC LANGUAGE BY PRESCHOOL CHILDREN AT AN ISLAMIC KINDERGARTEN: AN EARLY EXPLORATION

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Muhammad Anas Al-Muhsin*, Nor Zahidah Ahmad, Elsayed Makki Elbishr, Li Tinglin, Souad Elamin Elycee Abderrahim Bouabid

Abstract

This study examines the language functions used by children in an Islamic oriented preschool. The aim is to gather information on the use of language functions when children communicate with their teacher and among themselves in the classroom. The language that is used by the children and the teacher is Malay as this is the language used by the teacher in teaching Islamic subjects. However, indirectly, the information obtained reveals the language functions that will be used by children when they communicate using the Arabic language. Hence a module on the use of the Arabic language for communication can be produced for pre-schoolers (Zucher et al., 2010). The subjects in this study comprise a teacher and fifteen pupils in a preschool. Eight lessons conducted by the teacher were observed. The lessons were audi-recorded and later transcribed. The data were analysed using criteria used by Saville-Troikeand also by Halliday. The criteria used by these two linguists are almost similar except for a few more language functions which Halliday proposed. The findings of this study provide information necessary for the production.

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