Designing AI-Mediated Arabic Learning Ecologies: Learner Agency, Target Activities, and Productive Constraints
Keywords:
Arabic as a Foreign Language, generative AI, learner agency, pedagogical design, language-learning ecologyAbstract
Generative AI is reshaping Arabic education by redistributing linguistic work among learners, teachers, and technology. This conceptual-analytical study examines four adult learners across diverse Arabic-use contexts. Findings reveal that GenAI’s value depends on alignment with learners’ target activities and language ecologies, not support volume. The paper introduces the Target–Ecology–Gap–AI Affordance–Constraint–Agency heuristic. GenAI expands interaction and access to registers but should be constrained when it replaces target competence. Teachers should design learner–AI interaction while fostering learners’ capacity for independent regulation
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