Language Learning

Connecting Arabic Letters (1) Connecting Arabic letters is the focus of this lesson. Arabic is a cursive language; therefore, its letters must be joined to form words. This entails that the shape of the letter changes. This change is not straightforward, as the letter can have three different shapes: one at the beginning of the word, one in the middle of the word, and one at t…

الْمَلِــــكُ مَيْــــدَاسُ We took this Arabic short story from a short story book written by Kamil Kilani. The original story was written for native speakers of Arabic. It has been simplified, abridged, and slightly modified to make it suitable for learners of Arabic as an additional/foreign language. It is suitable for high-beginners and pre-intermediate learners. فِي قَ…

ثَمَرَةُ الْخِلَافِ This is an Arabic short story for foreigners. We took it from a book written by Kamil Keilany, an Egyptian writer and a poet. The original text was written for native speakers of Arabic. To make it suitable for learners of Arabic as a foreign language, it has been abridged, simplified, and slightly modified. Some of the details in the original story have be…

taa maftuha and taa marbuta ت / ـت and ة / ـة taa maftuha and taa marbuta as well as the haa marbuta are difficult to differentiate. For learners of Arabic as a foreign language, it is always difficult to distinguish between ت/ـت, ة/ـة, and ه/ـه when they occur at the end of words, and so is the case for native speakers. ت/ـت is called taa maftuha (تَاء مَفْتُوحَة) ; ة/ـة is…

Vowels in Arabic Vowels in Arabic are called harakat حَرَكَات, the singular of which is haraka حَرَكَة. Fortunately for the learners of Arabic as a foreign language, they are simple and limited. They are simple in that they are easily produced which makes the articulation of words straightforward. These vowels are [a], [i], and [u]; and for each short vowel, there is a corresp…

تَوَتُّرٌ عَلَى الْحُدُودِ بَيْنَ إِسْرَائِيلَ وَلُبْنَانَ جَرَّفَتْ إِسْرَائِيلُ بَعْضَ الْأَرَاضِي عَلَى الْحُدُودِ مَعَ لُبْنَانَ. تُرِيدُ إِسْرَائِيلُ أَنْ تَبْنِيَ جِدَارً. تَقُولُ إِسْرَائِيلُ إِنَّ هَذَا الْجِدَارَ سَوْفَ يُحَصِّنُ حُدُودَهَا. حَدَثَتْ عَمَلِيَّاتُ الْتَجْرِيفِ وَالتَّحْصِينِ فِي بَلْدَةِ كَفَرْشُوبَا. تَقَعُ هَذِهِ الْبَلْدَةُ عَلَى حُدُودِ لِبْن…