The Arabic Alphabet: How to Read & Write It Paperback – October 1, 2000

When I bought this book it was with the goal of being able to read and write Arabic. I can honestly say that over the course of a week and a half I was able to both read and write Arabic with no more than about 8-10 hours of study.What I did was read the explanations in the book and simply write every example given for two full lines (right to left) on a standard notebook paper. By the time I was done with every example in the book, I was basically able to read and write with very little difficulty.Of course this doesn't make my pronunciation perfect and it doesn't mean I know what things MEAN when I read them, but this book did exactly what I wanted it to do and that is guide me through the alphabet. I read a guy's blog that said a book is not necessary when learning the Arabic alphabet. I agree this is true. The same can be said of Japanese hiragana/katakana, and Korean Hangeul. Indeed, I learned those writing systems both with and without the aid of books. In my opinion, a little guidance and reassurance is nice when first learning a language and I chose to pay the premium on having my information given to me in a handy form of small, paperback book.If you want to learn the Arabic Alphabet and are willing to spend some money for convenience, this book is great and it can work for you.

This is the absolute best place to start if you're just beginning with arabic. Every beginner's book that I've read only dedicates 2-3 pages or an appendix to the arabic alphabet, but I think a more thorough understanding is required. The book is about 30 pages and teaches you the basics of the alphabet. There are so many little rules that one never thinks about when studying a language and this book does an excellent job of desribing them. For example a beginner's English book would describe how to pronounce the letter "g" but a good book will reveal the shades of pronounciation. What happens when an English word ends with "-ough?" This book does a thorough and brief (yes this is possible) job of enumerating the rules of an alphabet that most English speaking people have never used. Letters in arabic don't precisly correspond to letters we use, there are certain restrictions and exceptions just like in English and this is a must-have for anyone who really wants to be able to understand the basics before going on. However, this book is only a starting point and does not attempt to teach any grammer, vocabulary, or conjugation.

This an excellent entry level and first book book to learn the Arabic alphabet, and a great value.I bought this book to teach my US born son my native (Arabic) language alphabet and script at home, and find it book very helpful and easy to use as guide to teach him the Arabic alphabet.This book is exactly how I rated it, 5 stars, because it is well designed for a student just starting to study Arabic. It is a very good book for building basic understanding of the Arabic language alphabet.It's the best way introduce and learn the language to non-Arabic speakers.An awesome buy and highly recommended1st Grade learning Arabic Language Step - By - Step Approach Workbook Part 1 Third Edition: This book has everything you need to know to teach First ... children or students Arabic. (Arabic Edition)1st Grade learning Arabic Language Step - By - Step Approach Workbook Part 2,Third Edition: This book has everything you need to teach children the ... to teach your children or students Arabic.

This book starts out fantastically as a guide to someone wanting to learn the Arabic alphabet. It is very well organized and very effective in its methods. The first 30 or so pages describe how to use this book and help the reader gain an understanding of how the letters are pronounced and how words are formed and so on.In the section where it describes each letter and how it is written in each of its forms, Awde doesn't go through the alphabet in order, but rather goes by the simplest and most common used letters first, such as baa, taa, and thaa. With each letter, the pronunciation is briefly reviewed and how it is written in each of the four possible positions is shown.However, as the book progresses further into the letters, it seems the editing fell apart a bit. With some letters, the guiding arrows that help direct the reader in a step by step formation of the letter are missing. Now, the few times where this is the case, it can usually be figured out, but is still a little annoying.The one letter family I thought was poorly executed was the jiim, Haa', and khaa' family. The way to write the initial and medial forms is shown in a way that is never used, and the way that I have always seen it written is not shown. It is close to it, but not the same.However, despite these couple minor hiccups, the book is definitely helpful in gaining a better understanding of the Arabic alphabet. But by no means is this book where you should stop if you are looking to learn the language at any level.

I have some Iraqi friends that I spend time with, and I just wasn't picking up the language verbally. I tried to write the words down phonetically in English to study, but haven't gotten very far with that either. After two evenings of focused reading of this book, I have a much better understanding of what's happening with the language, and already know 7 letters. I can read several words and see how the letters fit together. I'm excited to continue my study of this language both for work use and to be able to speak more easily with my friends.Note: Read the introduction. Read and pay attention to the first two chapters, but don't get discouraged by anything that feels complicated at first. Keep going - the book does a good job of giving you more practice and examples for a more thorough understanding.OVERALL, GREAT BOOK AND WELL WORTH THE MONEY, I would have paid more if I knew how helpful it would be.