Bolton · Manchester · Bradford · & beyond
مجلس معلمي اللغة العربية في شمال غرب بريطانيا

The Arabic Teacher Council,
Northwest.

A community of Arabic-language teachers across the North of England — meeting, training, celebrating Arab culture, and supporting one another in classrooms from supplementary Saturday schools to mainstream sixth forms. Funded and organised by Qatar Foundation International, led by Mrs. Fatima Mohamed.

Discover our community →
6Towns we draw from
20+Workshops since 2020
45Teachers at our last training
Jan 2020The council's starting point
Council members holding their certificates after the May 2026 training on AI in Arabic teaching
Latest · 30 May 2026

A successful close to 2025–26.

The Arabic Teacher Council (Northwest) has successfully planned and organised the final training of the academic year — an excellent session by Mrs. Muntaha Aafan on using AI in the teaching and learning of Arabic.

The training was useful, informative, and genuinely interactive — members left with practical techniques to take straight back into their classrooms.

See all recent trainings →
The official poster for the 30 May 2026 training on skills in using AI in Arabic teachingCourse programme · 30 May 2026
Who we are

A council built by teachers, for teachers.

Founded in January 2020, the Arabic Teacher Council (Northwest) is a network of Arabic-language educators working across supplementary Saturday schools, mainstream secondaries, sixth forms and online communities. Our aim is to raise the standard of teaching Arabic language and culture across the UK — and to create real awareness of this language in our local communities. We share what works in the classroom, prepare students for GCSE and A-Level, and advocate for Arabic as a meaningful Modern Foreign Language in British education.

Professional development

Workshops on speaking, writing, reading and exam technique — led by experienced teachers and exam-board specialists.

A community of practice

A safe space to swap resources, raise concerns about exam reform, and find peers who teach the same students you do.

Culture & identity

Annual culture days that bring children, parents and teachers together around food, calligraphy, henna, music and games.

A voice for Arabic

Engaging with exam boards and the wider sector so that Arabic GCSE and A-Level remain accessible to native and non-native learners alike.

Where we are

Six towns. One council.

Members come from across Greater Manchester, Lancashire, West Yorkshire and the North East. Most of us teach on Saturdays at supplementary schools, and during the week in mainstream classrooms, tutoring, or online.

  • Bolton
  • Manchester
  • Blackburn
  • Bradford
  • Chorley
  • Newcastle
NewcastleBradfordBlackburnChorleyBoltonManchesterNorthern England — a stylised view
Years of work

Workshops, training, and culture days.

Six academic years. From building wellbeing in lockdown to live sessions on the reformed Edexcel exam. Here is what we have run together.

2020 — 21

The first full year — built almost entirely online

The pandemic year. We met where we could and trained where we couldn't.

  • Arabic teaching & learning · Mr Saleh and Yosra AgilBolton
  • GCSE speaking practice · Fatima MohamedBolton
  • Building confidence & teacher wellbeing · SHE Inspires FoundationBolton
  • Arabic Culture DayBolton
  • Changes in Arabic GCSE exams · Nada Khalaf, EdexcelOnline
  • Arabic community online lessons · Tamadar Al HowiediOnline
2021 — 22

Returning in person, learning from across the Atlantic

Members travelled to the ACTFL conference and we ran our first post-lockdown culture day.

  • Arabic Culture DayBolton
  • ACTFL conference attendanceManchester
  • Arabic speaking skills · Luma HameedOnline
2022 — 23

Sharpening the four skills

Specialist sessions on the parts of the exam our students find hardest.

  • Writing & translation skills · Luma HameedOnline
  • Reading & understanding · Heba AlhelbawiOnline
  • Arabic Culture DayBolton
2023 — 24

From primary classroom to GCSE hall

Building a coherent framework that follows a child from year 3 to year 11.

  • Preparing students for exams in all skills · Nada Khalaf, EdexcelOnline
  • Writing & speaking framework, primary & high school · Luma HameedManchester
  • Arabic Culture DayBolton
2024 — 25

A full-day, in-person training — and forty-five teachers in the room

Our biggest single training to date, co-presented by Dr. Safa Elgak and Nada Khalaf.

  • Saturday 7 December — full-day training (45 teachers)Manchester
  • Online training: speaking exam, teacher conduct & raising attainmentOnline
  • Arabic Culture Day · AprilBolton MGS
2025 — 26

Reading, writing — and the active classroom

This year we have leaned into pedagogy: how Arabic teachers actually run a lesson.

  • GCSE reading & writing CPD · Nada Khalaf, Edexcel · 8 November 2025Manchester
  • Active learning & designing model exams · Dr. Mufida Ouda · 7 February 2026Manchester
  • AI in Arabic teaching & learning · Mrs. Muntaha Aafan · 30 May 2026Manchester
  • Arabic Culture Day & Taste of ArabiaManchester
Arabic Culture Dayيوم الثقافة العربية

The day the corridors fill with flags, food and family.

Each spring our culture day turns a school corridor into something between a wedding, a souk and a science fair. Children hold up the flags of Algeria, Somalia, Egypt, Syria, Morocco, Palestine — wherever their families are from. There is calligraphy. There is a clown on stilts. There is far, far too much baklava.

It is the moment in the year that reminds the council why this work matters: a generation of children seeing their language honoured in front of their parents and their teachers, in their own city.

The culture day bazaar entrance, framed by the flags of Arab nations
Crowds at the culture day bazaar, with a clown on stilts in Palestinian colours
Children at the culture day, holding flags of their families' home countries
A long buffet of Arabic dishes prepared by parents and teachers
Taste of Arabiaمذاق العرب

A dining hall that becomes a regional cookbook.

Mothers, teachers and older students bring in dishes from home: Moroccan tagine and ka'ak, Palestinian maftoul, Syrian sweets, Yemeni breads. We line them down a forty-foot table and the queue stretches up the stairs.

A small portion of the proceeds always goes to communities that need it more than we do — most recently to relief in Türkiye and Syria. It is the council at its most domestic, and arguably its most political.

Glimpses

A year in pictures.

Calligraphy stalls, henna queues, bookmarks, board games, traditional dress — moments from culture days, training rooms and classrooms.

A teacher in traditional Yemeni dress at a council stall
Traditional dress · culture day
An Arabic-language board game in play
Arabic Language Learning Clinic — board game
Eid Mubarak greeting cards and ayah frames laid out for sale
Eid greeting cards
White t-shirts hand-painted with Arabic calligraphy of children's names
Hand-painted name tees
Trays of Moroccan baklava and pastries on a stand draped with the Moroccan flag
Moroccan pastries
A live henna table at the culture day
Henna · live
Bilingual Arabic learning resources — days of the week, weather, prayer counters
Classroom resources
Ayah frames and watercolour bookmarks for sale at the calligraphy stall
Ayah frames & bookmarks
A table of Arabic quiz games and mosaic prayer mats for adult learners
Arabic quiz · adult learners
The Arabic Honor Society poster contest winner from Bolton Muslim Girls School
Poster contest winner — Bolton MGS
A long buffet of home-cooked food at a community Iftar
The Iftar / community buffet
The bazaar in full swing — stalls, students and parents
Stalls in full swing
Recent milestones

Four trainings that defined the past two years.

Funded by Qatar Foundation International, with sessions hosted across our partner schools — most recently at Noor Arabic School in Manchester. Each one ended with handed-out certificates and a long table of teachers swapping classroom tricks.

The Arabic-language programme poster for the 7 December 2024 ATC training, in partnership with Qatar Foundation International
7 December 2024

The first full-day, in-person CPD

Forty-five Arabic teachers met at Noor Arabic School for a full Saturday on teaching methods, then on Edexcel updates and exam preparation. Co-presented by Dr. Safa Elgak and Nada Khalaf.

Dr. Safa Elgak · Nada Khalaf · QFI
Poster for the 8 November 2025 GCSE reading and writing training, presented by Nada Khalaf of Edexcel
8 November 2025

GCSE reading & writing, with Edexcel

Nada Khalaf returned for a deep dive on the reading and writing papers — mark schemes, common pitfalls, and practical activities to lift students' scores. We spent the afternoon designing classroom tasks together.

Nada Khalaf · Edexcel · QFI
Poster for the 7 February 2026 active-learning training and model-exam design workshop
7 February 2026

Active learning & designing model exams

Dr. Mufida Ouda led a workshop on active-learning strategies — getting the quietest students talking — and on the principles of writing a fair, useful model exam. Certificates handed out at 3:30pm.

Dr. Mufida Ouda · Noor Arabic School · QFI
Poster for the 30 May 2026 training on skills in using AI in Arabic teaching
30 May 2026

AI in Arabic teaching — the final training of 2025-26

Mrs. Muntaha Aafan (Master's in Applied AI and Data Analytics) led an excellent, interactive workshop on using AI to enhance Arabic teaching and learning. Members left with practical techniques to take straight back into their classrooms.

Mrs. Muntaha Aafan · Noor Arabic School · QFI
Voices from the staffroom

An ongoing conversation about Arabic GCSE.

A recurring theme in our group chats: the 2016 GCSE reform brought Arabic in line with other modern foreign languages — but didn't fully account for the additional learning hours Arabic script and morphology require. Members discuss it candidly.

I'm sure we have in this group teachers teaching Arabic at university level — and the level at university is less than the GCSE and A-Level. Arabic used to be easier before 2016, but since they tried to bring it in line with the other MFLs, things became more challenging. They didn't take into consideration that Arabic has a different script and requires more hours.

— Member, council group chat

We teach in international schools and the minority are our Arab heritage students. We have students who are non-Arabs and love to do the course, but with what they're seeing they are all quitting it and choosing other languages.

— Member, on retention

I teach MSA and it's much, much easier than GCSE. This is taught at university level as well. Most candidates these past years are heritage / native speakers who manage good grades. The non-native speakers are still the minority — and unfortunately the most affected.

— Member, on the cohort gap
Screenshot of a teacher's Facebook comment about Arabic GCSE difficultyContinuation of the same Facebook discussion about heritage and non-native speakersA teacher's comment that MSA at university is easier than GCSE
Challenges

What we're up against

  • Diary clash. Many of us teach Saturdays at supplementary schools and weekdays at mainstream schools — finding a single date that works for the whole council is genuinely hard.
  • Severity of GCSE. The reformed exam is putting learners off choosing Arabic, and lowering the self-esteem of teachers whose results don't reflect the work.
  • Few Arabic-speaking TAs. Most schools have no support staff who can step in for an Arabic lesson — meaning teachers can't be ill, can't be on a course, can't be anywhere else.
Looking ahead

Where we want to be next year

  • More members. Especially from primary classrooms, where the foundation is set.
  • More CPD. Targeted training for primary and high-school teachers separately.
  • More face-to-face. Online has its place — but the staffroom kettle works miracles online can't.
  • More learners in national competitions. Our students should be on those podiums.
  • More motivation, full stop. To learn Arabic, to teach Arabic, to keep going.
  • More sharing. Resources, lesson sequences, ways of teaching — pooled, not hoarded.
Council lead

The people who steer the council.

A lead and three executive members, all serving Arabic teachers and learners across the North alongside their day jobs in the classroom.

Head of the Council

Mrs. Fatima Mohamed

Teacher of Arabic Language

Heba Al Hanouti

Executive member

Riham Elbaz

Executive member

Niveen Sydem

Executive member
Host schools

The schools that make this work.

Two schools share the practical work of the council — one hosts the QFI-funded programme and the council's administrative home, the other hosts our teacher training days.

Host school · QFI funding

Bolton Muslim Girls School

BMGS is the home of our council head Mrs. Fatima Mohamed, and the administrative base for the council's QFI-funded programme.

Host school · CPDs

Al-Noor Arabic Supplementary School

Our teacher training days — the all-day in-person CPDs — are hosted at Al-Noor Arabic School in Manchester, including the December 2024, November 2025, February 2026 and May 2026 trainings.

Sponsor & partners

Made possible by Qatar Foundation International.

Everything the council does — every training, every culture day, every set of materials we bring back to our classrooms — is funded and organised by QFI.

Funder · Organiser

Qatar Foundation International

QFI funds and organises the Arabic Teacher Council (Northwest). Their continued support for Arabic-language education across the United Kingdom pays for our trainings, our trainers' travel, our classroom materials, and the all-day in-person CPDs that bring members together from across the North.