Investigation of iPad tasks and activities carried out by the teachers and students of the foundation program of the Men’s & Women’s Colleges in Fujairah, United Arab Emirates

Abstract

The purpose of this study was to investigate the types of tasks and activities, and the frequencies the teachers and students in the Foundations Program of the Fujairah Men’s College and Fujairah Women’s College used the iPad for. This new technology was introduced to enable the Program’s teachers and students to support their teaching and learning of English as a foreign language. The data for the research were drawn from class observations, interviews and surveys. The data for this research were collected by means of two online surveys involving the Foundations Program’s teachers and students, six class observations and five interviews of the teachers who conducted the classes. For further acquisition of data, two surveys – one for the teachers and one for the students – were conducted. The findings of the study revealed that the use of the iPad promoted student engagement with the material taught and enhanced their focus on the activities and tasks involving the new technology. The present study contributes to better understanding of the issues involved in introducing a new technology into a learning environment and it goes some way to fill an existing gap in the literature on mobile language learning in general and iPad-based English language learning in particular.