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Help with learning language fluently.

  Tags: Beginner | Arabic
 Language Learning Forum : Learning Techniques, Methods & Strategies Post Reply
nadiatwinkle
Newbie
United Kingdom
Joined 5208 days ago

6 posts - 6 votes
Speaks: English*
Studies: Arabic (classical)

 
 Message 1 of 8
13 December 2011 at 3:44am | IP Logged 
OK, so to make a long story short, I am doing extra cred at uni by taking a year-long course in arabic. It teaches classical arabic and we practice reading, writing and speaking.

I am arabic myself, and I have some advantage in that I can speak iraqi arabic (very badly, almost not even worth mentioning) so I know a bit of basic vocab. The course is only once a week for 3 hours so alot of self-study has to be done. This is the issue i have. I don't know what to do everyday to build up my ability to read/speak/write arabic. How should I go about it? Was hoping someone could give me an idea of what they do each day to practice a language (taking into account i'm at begginner level). Help will be greatly appreciated!


1 person has voted this message useful



cathrynm
Senior Member
United States
junglevision.co
Joined 6111 days ago

910 posts - 1232 votes 
Speaks: English*
Studies: Japanese, Finnish

 
 Message 2 of 8
13 December 2011 at 4:17am | IP Logged 
For writing, I like http://lang-8.com -- if you're a native English speaker, my guess is you'll have good luck getting Arabic corrected.   My impression is that there are a lot of Arabic speakers out there looking to do language exchange with English speakers.   They contact me sometimes on, also on http://www.sharedtalk.com , even though I don't study this language.
1 person has voted this message useful



KSAKSA
Groupie
Australia
Joined 5131 days ago

65 posts - 99 votes 
Speaks: English*
Studies: Arabic (Gulf)

 
 Message 3 of 8
13 December 2011 at 10:32am | IP Logged 
For listening / vocab building and reading practice: There is ArabicPod as well which is a stellar resource and is worthwhile listening to regularly - http://www.arabicpod.net/user/home - their lessons are sometimes MSA focussed and othertimes dialect. If you join up as a member you can access dialogue coaching, post lesson commentary and transcripts.

It may prove an unpopular suggestion to some but...get hold of the Michel Thomas series. I do realise it is egyptian dialect BUT it will definitely help get you thinking about the grammer rules as you speak and progress you towards your goal. The beginners is frustrating but the advanced one is better if you are at that level (which I suspect you probably are).

For reading / writing practice: Easy Arabic Reader http://www.amazon.com/Easy-Arabic-Reader/dp/0071754024 is a cheap and readily available resource which I think is remarkably good...and you can download the spoken content from the publishers website for free.

Are you using Al Kitaab in your course? I find the exercises on the DVD that give you the new word and then it spoken in a sentence really useful.
2 persons have voted this message useful



Arekkusu
Hexaglot
Senior Member
Canada
bit.ly/qc_10_lec
Joined 5367 days ago

3971 posts - 7747 votes 
Speaks: English, French*, GermanC1, Spanish, Japanese, Esperanto
Studies: Italian, Norwegian, Mandarin, Romanian, Estonian

 
 Message 4 of 8
13 December 2011 at 4:27pm | IP Logged 
For speaking, I recommend a self-talk exercise I suggested a while back on my log.

Edited by Arekkusu on 13 December 2011 at 4:27pm

2 persons have voted this message useful



JiriT
Triglot
Groupie
Czech Republic
Joined 4783 days ago

60 posts - 95 votes 
Speaks: Czech*, English, German

 
 Message 5 of 8
13 December 2011 at 9:05pm | IP Logged 
nadiatwinkle wrote:
OK, so to make a long story short, I am doing extra cred at uni by taking a year-long course in arabic. It teaches classical arabic and we practice reading, writing and speaking.

I am arabic myself, and I have some advantage in that I can speak iraqi arabic (very badly, almost not even worth mentioning) so I know a bit of basic vocab. The course is only once a week for 3 hours so alot of self-study has to be done. This is the issue i have. I don't know what to do everyday to build up my ability to read/speak/write arabic. How should I go about it? Was hoping someone could give me an idea of what they do each day to practice a language (taking into account i'm at begginner level). Help will be greatly appreciated!


I think it is too premature to expect fluency, when you are a beginner in Arabic. You have a course at the university, so you should learn for the course. Even after one year / 3 hours a week in one session you would not be able to speak fluently. But you can learn some basics of the language and you should learn it well. To learn basic grammar and vocabulary is for speaking necessary. I believe before one tries to begin speaking they should learn the basics of the language - the basic grammar and vocabulary (at least 2000 words). You should learn the basics of the language really well. To understand the grammar well and to be able to make simple sentence quicky and to remember the vocabulary well (to be able to recollect a word quickly).
1 person has voted this message useful



nadiatwinkle
Newbie
United Kingdom
Joined 5208 days ago

6 posts - 6 votes
Speaks: English*
Studies: Arabic (classical)

 
 Message 6 of 8
14 December 2011 at 1:04pm | IP Logged 
JiriT wrote:
nadiatwinkle wrote:
OK, so to make a long story short, I am doing extra cred at uni by taking a year-long course in arabic. It teaches classical arabic and we practice reading, writing and speaking.

I am arabic myself, and I have some advantage in that I can speak iraqi arabic (very badly, almost not even worth mentioning) so I know a bit of basic vocab. The course is only once a week for 3 hours so alot of self-study has to be done. This is the issue i have. I don't know what to do everyday to build up my ability to read/speak/write arabic. How should I go about it? Was hoping someone could give me an idea of what they do each day to practice a language (taking into account i'm at begginner level). Help will be greatly appreciated!


I think it is too premature to expect fluency, when you are a beginner in Arabic. You have a course at the university, so you should learn for the course. Even after one year / 3 hours a week in one session you would not be able to speak fluently. But you can learn some basics of the language and you should learn it well. To learn basic grammar and vocabulary is for speaking necessary. I believe before one tries to begin speaking they should learn the basics of the language - the basic grammar and vocabulary (at least 2000 words). You should learn the basics of the language really well. To understand the grammar well and to be able to make simple sentence quicky and to remember the vocabulary well (to be able to recollect a word quickly).


I am not expecting fluency after a year on this course, I just want to know in what direction I should go to achieve it eventually. I did a language before at school but never really worked at it so i don't know what I should do to advance. What should I do everyday? Learn some grammar, a few more verbs, vocab or just follow a book? Im finding it hard to organise myself and find a good routine to follow.

Edited by nadiatwinkle on 14 December 2011 at 1:04pm

1 person has voted this message useful



KSAKSA
Groupie
Australia
Joined 5131 days ago

65 posts - 99 votes 
Speaks: English*
Studies: Arabic (Gulf)

 
 Message 7 of 8
15 December 2011 at 11:14am | IP Logged 
Just ensure you do a little of SOMETHING every day - mix it up, keep it interesting...some days you'll want to do flash cards, others verb forms, others grammar and then some days you'll likely not want to do anything (even though it is best if you do).

Follow the programme set by the Uni - read the book they provide, do the exercises and memorise your vocab and then use arabicpod.net for supplementary listening exercises.
1 person has voted this message useful



JiriT
Triglot
Groupie
Czech Republic
Joined 4783 days ago

60 posts - 95 votes 
Speaks: Czech*, English, German

 
 Message 8 of 8
15 December 2011 at 9:50pm | IP Logged 
nadiatwinkle wrote:
JiriT wrote:
nadiatwinkle wrote:
OK, so to make a long story
short, I am doing extra cred at uni by taking a year-long course in arabic. It teaches
classical arabic and we practice reading, writing and speaking.

I am arabic myself, and I have some advantage in that I can speak iraqi arabic (very
badly, almost not even worth mentioning) so I know a bit of basic vocab. The course is
only once a week for 3 hours so alot of self-study has to be done. This is the issue i
have. I don't know what to do everyday to build up my ability to read/speak/write
arabic. How should I go about it? Was hoping someone could give me an idea of what they
do each day to practice a language (taking into account i'm at begginner level). Help
will be greatly appreciated!


I think it is too premature to expect fluency, when you are a beginner in Arabic. You
have a course at the university, so you should learn for the course. Even after one
year / 3 hours a week in one session you would not be able to speak fluently. But you
can learn some basics of the language and you should learn it well. To learn basic
grammar and vocabulary is for speaking necessary. I believe before one tries to begin
speaking they should learn the basics of the language - the basic grammar and
vocabulary (at least 2000 words). You should learn the basics of the language really
well. To understand the grammar well and to be able to make simple sentence quicky and
to remember the vocabulary well (to be able to recollect a word quickly).


I am not expecting fluency after a year on this course, I just want to know in what
direction I should go to achieve it eventually. I did a language before at school but
never really worked at it so i don't know what I should do to advance. What should I do
everyday? Learn some grammar, a few more verbs, vocab or just follow a book? Im finding
it hard to organise myself and find a good routine to follow.


I cannot give you more concrete advice. If Arabic is your first foreign language you
learn, it is something quite different as the situation of a person, who begins to
learn a second or third language. I prefer independent learning without a teacher. But
to be able this, it is very usuful to have some knowledge from a language course.
Everyone must develop his way of learning himself. What work for other people well may
not work so well for you. As I wrote, prepare well for the lesons at the course. After
some time try to learn something in addition to it. It may be reading other texts or
listening to the language. But its is now to premature. After a year you will have some
knowledge, then try to learn not only in the course but from other sources. Now you
should develop the best method for you for memorising vocabulary. When you train your
memomory, your ability to remember will be better in some time. You could try to
memorise by using flash cards or Anki or word lists. Remember, when you learn some 2000
words, you will know most words in any text.And try to be motivated to learn the
language. Then you will develop your own method how to learn the language. Read here,
experience of other people can help you a lot.


1 person has voted this message useful



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