Tips for learning vocabulary

[trliber]

بعد ان رجعت الى الولايات و اتخرج من الجامعة انا وحيدا برحلتي لتعليم العربية و أقراء الاخبار و كتبي مكتوبة بالعربية الفصحى ولكن أرى كثيرا من الكلمات الجديدة و فاهم الكتابة صعبة عليّ. هكذا أريد ان أتعلم اكثر من المفدات فأنا لا أعرف الطرق الاحسنة لتعليمها. ماذا رأيكم انها الطرق الاحسنة لتعليم مفردات جديدة؟

(EN: After I've come back to the States (from Jordan) and graduated from university I'm alone on my journey of learning Arabic. I read the news and my books written in Standard Arabic but I see many new words and understanding the writing is difficult for me. Because of that, I want to learn more vocabulary but I don't know the best ways to do it. What do you guys think are the best ways to learn new vocabulary?)

...by the way, the Arabic font on this site is nice looking and easy to read, I wish it were more common online and in books!

[Meera]

I need advice on this too

[Babelfish]

It depends on the person I guess, I think there's a thread about this topic in the General Language Forum. Some people use flashcards or vocabulary lists. I myself just try to read a lot and write a bit (in forums, where others can correct me) and with time the new words stick in memory.

[eskandar]

Maybe this is obvious, but whenever I learn a new word in Arabic, I spend some time trying to learn several of the other words derived from the same root.

Another thing is to keep a notebook next to you while you're reading (newspapers, books, whatever). Whenever you come across a new word that you have to look up in the dictionary, write it down. Just the act of writing it helps me remember, and later you can create flashcards from your notebook. Anki is a really good program for making digital flashcards for your computer/phone/etc.

[Meera]

shukran eskander

[Hannahanneke]

Hi! مرحبا

I used the book "The top 1,000 words for understanding Media Arabic" by Elisabeth Kendall (Georgetown University Press) and I found it excellent! I'm very enthousiastic about it and would recommend it to anyone trying to understand Arabic media. The books also contains lots of often used abbreviations, such as the United Nations, Amnesty International, Greenpeace etc.

To understand media Arabic in general in terms of grammar, construction of sentences etc I recommend the book of Julia Ashtiany, "Media Arabic". I have the audio files of some of the texts of that book as well, if someone is interested.

As last I have the book "Vocabulaire thématique, كيف نقول Comment dit-on...?" by Lynne Franjié (Ellipses), but I don't recommend it as much as the other books, 'cause it contains some mistakes and you have to check the words sometimes. The book contains every day language organised by theme.

[Meera]

This book sounds good I think I will get it.

[trliber]

اهلا يا جميع

استكشفت انها الطريقة الاحسنة لي تعليم المفردات من اجل الاصوات بدل من القراءة فأنا أتـسجل صوتي على الكومبيوتر و أوضع الفآيل على الآيبود و أستمعه خلال يومي و إنها فرصة جديدة للتكرار

I didn't know I was more of a sound person than visual. I always thought I was visual because I prefer instructions to 'show' me rather than 'tell' me.

By-the-way, what font does this forum use, it's very cool

[moq]

To understand media Arabic in general in terms of grammar, construction of sentences etc I recommend the book of Julia Ashtiany, "Media Arabic". I have the audio files of some of the texts of that book as well, if someone is interested.

Hi Hannah, I just came across this post and have been looking high and low for a copy of the audio files. Might you still have them? Many thanks!

[vijayjohn]

I'm just going to repeat a piece of advice that I've both seen and propagated elsewhere on the forum but with slightly different words: If you're already reading in Arabic, that will already help you with your vocabulary. It's okay if you don't know all the vocabulary. The more you read, the more you'll get used to it.