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Has anyone taught themselves Arabic?!? | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Language Programs, Books & Tapes |  | |
| cmj Octoglot Groupie Switzerland Joined 5339 days ago 58 posts - 191 votes  Speaks: English*, German, Spanish, Ancient Greek, French, Arabic (classical), Latin, Italian | Message 17 of 70 29 December 2010 at 10:55am | IP Logged | ||||||||||||||
Yeah. The date of the new release is actually 2008 not 2005, but they are different courses. A second author (Dominique Halbout, I think) was added. I couldn't do a detailed comparison since I saw Assimil with Ease in the bookstore, but I had already worked through the new version, so I could tell fairly easily that they were more or less completely different. Here are a couple of threads I dug up discussing the new version. I think people are a little too critical frankly, particularly since they seem to focus on the early lessons. It does start slowly, but then it picks up speed really fast in the latter half and the expressions and vocabulary I learned have been extremely useful. The fact that they teach you the classical case endings at the beginning helps you make sense of their irregular appearances in the language. The criticisms of the one French guy don't really make any sense. The whole point is to teach you MSA... http://how-to-learn-any-language.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?T ID=19442&PN=18 http://how-to-learn-any-language.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?T ID=12274&PN=39 2 persons have voted this message useful | |||||||||||||||
| Juаn Senior Member Colombia Joined 5346 days ago 727 posts - 1830 votes Speaks: Spanish* | Message 18 of 70 29 December 2010 at 5:06pm | IP Logged | ||||||||||||||
Thanks for the clarification. I'll try to get both. I agree with cmj's assessment. That it starts out slowly is better than to move to fast, especially when you're getting a lot of content in the second volume. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||||||||||||||
| Mikael84 Bilingual Pentaglot Groupie Peru Joined 5301 days ago 76 posts - 116 votes Speaks: French*, Finnish*, English, Spanish, Portuguese Studies: Arabic (classical), German, Russian | Message 19 of 70 29 December 2010 at 8:44pm | IP Logged | ||||||||||||||
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People on this forum must be geniuses. As I said earlier, IMO the problem is that the pace and complexity pick up a little too quickly all of a sudden. The deliberately slow pace at first I think is very important in order to make sure that the student fully assimilates the most important grammatical points (idafa, case endings, etc) + gets used to the language (writing, sounds...), which for most learners is completely alien at first.
I wrote Assimil an email asking why they hadn't made it longer, 100+ lessons (like Chinese). Got a very long and thoughtful reply from one of the authors, all credit to Assimil for the customer service. 2 persons have voted this message useful | |||||||||||||||
| liddytime Pentaglot Senior Member United States mainlymagyar.wordpre Joined 6230 days ago 693 posts - 1328 votes Speaks: English*, Spanish, Italian, Portuguese, Galician Studies: Hungarian, Vietnamese, Modern Hebrew, Norwegian, Persian, Arabic (Written) | Message 20 of 70 30 December 2010 at 12:21pm | IP Logged | ||||||||||||||
Yes, I saw both editions side to side. The newer version seems SO much better; not just in content, but the whole layout of the course seems better! 2 persons have voted this message useful | |||||||||||||||
| nebojats Triglot Groupie United States Joined 5197 days ago 89 posts - 120 votes Speaks: English*, Spanish, Thai Studies: French, Arabic (Written), Mandarin, Italian | Message 21 of 70 31 December 2010 at 7:34am | IP Logged | ||||||||||||||
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Hey!
I have been studying Arabic here in Thailand on my own for about... two months now? I took a year of MSA back in college and my goal is to get MSA up as much as possible before I go abroad to pick up a dialect. My program has been as follows: First, I worked through Read and Speak Arabic for Beginners (with CDs)... 30 minutes to an hour a day or so (usually more like 30 minutes), skipping weekends of course! Awesome! Fun! Easy! Good way to get the feet wet and not get intimidated. I really loved this book. I even stole some of the activities ideas to use in my classroom (I'm an English teacher). Since then, I have been working through Mastering Arabic. Same authors, similar style, also comes with CDs. The activities are pretty fun, it's not boring, but is definitely more advanced than Read and Speak Arabic for Beginners (although no way in hell would you end up being a "master"). At the same time, if I've had too much of Mastering Arabic, I'll work in Easy Arabic Grammar for a little bit (same authors, no CDs, similar style, although a little less fun and more information-packed.) I've been doing maybe thirty minutes to an hour of activities in those books a day (again, closer to 30 minutes usually), and turning all the vocab lists into flash cards... about ten new words a day. Also, I've been falling asleep to cartoons in Arabic (Future Boy a.k.a. Adnan wa Lena is one of the coolest cartoons ever! Grendizer is also pretty fun. Bayti al Arabi by Aljazeera Kids is like Sesame Street... I feel like I learn the most when I watch this show.). If I'm feeling really feisty, I'll listen to an episode of ArabicPod (that podcast is awesome beyond words) or maybe zone out to the BBC Extra Arabic podcast (I usually reserve the podcasts for when I'm having my mind numbed in traffic). I highly recommend all of these materials... they're effective, and almost importantly, they are fun! 8 persons have voted this message useful | |||||||||||||||
| KSAKSA Groupie Australia Joined 5146 days ago 65 posts - 99 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Arabic (Gulf) | Message 22 of 70 02 January 2011 at 7:41am | IP Logged | ||||||||||||||
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I think you could enjoy Michel Thomas as a 'refresher' since you studied previously...it'll dredge the cobwebs off the brain for the basics.
I'm using Al Kitaab right now, it isn't perfect but no material is/ I recommend it as it there is a lot of information there which will take you time to work through. Edited by KSAKSA on 02 January 2011 at 7:43am 2 persons have voted this message useful | |||||||||||||||
| liddytime Pentaglot Senior Member United States mainlymagyar.wordpre Joined 6230 days ago 693 posts - 1328 votes Speaks: English*, Spanish, Italian, Portuguese, Galician Studies: Hungarian, Vietnamese, Modern Hebrew, Norwegian, Persian, Arabic (Written) | Message 23 of 70 05 January 2011 at 4:26pm | IP Logged | ||||||||||||||
Isn't MT exclusively the Egyptian dialect or am I wrong about that?? 1 person has voted this message useful | |||||||||||||||
| Préposition Diglot Senior Member France aspectualpairs.wordp Joined 5115 days ago 186 posts - 283 votes Speaks: French*, EnglishC1 Studies: Russian, Arabic (Written), Swedish, Arabic (Levantine) | Message 24 of 70 05 January 2011 at 8:41pm | IP Logged | ||||||||||||||
You're entirely right. It's completely misleading to simply call it "Arabic", and I was very disappointed and frustrated by it, mainly because I dislike the dialect immensely, and also because there is no MSA whatsoever, and it really doesn't sound like it at all, so really, completely useless for MSA. 2 persons have voted this message useful |
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