This was originally posted by Michael829982
My native language is English and I'd never read Arabic script before or studied any Arabic. This course is a challenging one so I've come up with a few tips. This is aimed at people with a similar background (Indo-European language and can't read Naskh).
- Spend a lot of time on the abjad (alphabet). Unfortunately the script is tiny and annoying to read, but the phonetic exercises have larger writing. I'd also some suggest looking at some outside sources when you start the course.
- There is not enough instruction in reading. The pronunciation of words starting with an alif (آ,أ,إ,ا) is never explicit and still not clear from the phonetic exercises. It is confusing. There are plenty of helpful YouTube videos.
- The extra sounds. When you start doing sequences of words, you'll hear additional terminal sounds like -un, -tan, -an and so on that aren't written out. You aren’t misreading anything. This is called tanween in Arabic and nunation in English. Duolingo provides zero information on this, so look it up elsewhere. Again YT is helpful.
- Start by focusing on the dots. Trying to decode a series of letters like بيستن يب (not a real word) can you drive you nuts if you look at the whole character. Start by focusing on where the dots are (there's a helpful thread on this). /b/, /y/, /ee/ have the dots below, /n/ and /t/ have dots on top. It's not perfect but it made getting into reading easier for me. Also, the dots in a single character are centered over the main character, whereas in words the dots shift to the right side of the character.
- Read the comments. Tons of native speakers have provided very helpful comments on exercises, including pointing out errors in the course. Do read these.
- Go offline to read a bit of grammar. Arabic has two genders, declines adjectives, doesn't require pronouns for verbs, and many others.
- The syntax is very limited. In the course you won't learn any verbs outside the present tense, any plural pronouns, or any nouns larger than singular. Arabic has singular, dual, and plural. There are collective nouns that are syntactically singular, like الجبل (the mountains), but no duals or plurals.
That's it. I hope this is helpful. If anyone else has tips please share what you have in other threads.