12/03/2016
ARA 1511
Beginning Arabic I
COURSE Description
The course is designed to develop students’ language proficiency and cultural competency in Modern Standard Arabic and Moroccan Arabic in the four skills: Listening, Speaking, Reading, and Writing. However, the emphasis is heavily placed on the listening and speaking skills and the functional use of the Arabic language.
Following the ACTFL guidelines, the students will reach the following proficiency levels in each of the skills:
LISTENING: NOVICE MID: (2/3 MSA, 1/3 ‘AMMIYAA)
SPEAKING: NOVICE MID: (2/3 MSA, 1/3 ‘AMMIYAA)
READING: NOVICE LOW: (100% MSA)
WRITING: NOVICE LOW: (100% MSA)
Cultural aspects are built into the course through various tasks performed in class and activities conducted outside of the classroom, e.g. experiential learning, clubs, lectures, movies, and trips.
ARA 1512
Beginning Arabic II
COURSE Description
Beginning Two Course assumes that students have been introduced to letters and sounds, mastered based vocabulary and sentence structure in Arabic. In this level, students will work further on developing speaking, listening, reading, and writing skills in Arabic language and culture.
The course is proficiency-based, implying that all activities within the course are aimed at placing you, the learner, in the context of the native-speaking environment.
Evaluation is done in two ways: firstly, by the more traditional testing methods (vocabulary tests, dictations, grammar and translation exercises, etc.); secondly, through a series of proficiency weekly tests.
We anticipate that by the end of Beginning Two course students will have acquired proficiency on the ACTFL scale that will enable them to enroll in Intermediate one.
Course Goals in Terms of Proficiency:
The following statements will roughly describe your four language skills at the end of this course (adapted from the ACTFL guidelines).
SPEAKING:
• Speakers are able to handle successfully a limited number of uncomplicated communicative tasks by creating with the language in straightforward social situations.
• Conversation is restricted to some of the concrete exchanges and predictable topics necessary for survival in the target language culture.
• These topics relate to basic personal information covering, for example, self and family, some daily activities and personal preferences, as well as to some immediate needs, such as ordering food and making simple purchases.
• Speakers are primarily reactive and struggle to answer direct questions or requests for information, but they are also able to ask a few appropriate questions.
• They express personal meaning by combining and recombining into short statements what they know and what they hear from their interlocutors.
• Their utterances are often filled with hesitancy and inaccuracies as they search for appropriate linguistic forms and vocabulary while attempting to give form to the message.
• Their speech is characterized by frequent pauses, ineffective reformulations and self-corrections.
• Their pronunciation, vocabulary, and syntax are strongly influenced by their first language but, in spite of frequent misunderstandings that require repetition or rephrasing, they can generally be understood by sympathetic interlocutors, particularly by those accustomed to dealing with non-natives.
LISTENING:
• Able to understand sentence-length utterances which consist of recombination of learned elements in a limited number of content areas, particularly if strongly supported by the situational context.
• Content refers to basic personal background and needs, social conventions and routine tasks, such as getting meals and receiving simple instructions and directions.
• Listening tasks pertain primarily to spontaneous face-to-face conversations.
• Understanding is often uneven; repetition and rewording may be necessary.
• Misunderstandings in both main ideas and details arise frequently.
READING:
• Able to understand main ideas and/or some facts from the simplest connected texts dealing with basic personal and social needs.
• Such texts are linguistically noncomplex and have a clear underlying internal structure, for example chronological sequencing.
• They impart basic information about which the reader has to make only minimal suppositions or to which the reader brings personal interest and/or knowledge.
• Examples include messages with social purposes or information for the widest possible audience, such as public announcements and short, straightforward instructions dealing with public life. Some misunderstandings will occur.
WRITING:
• Students are able to meet some limited practical writing needs.
• They can create statements and formulate questions based on familiar material.
• Most sentences are recombinations of learned vocabulary and structures.
• These are short and simple conversational sentences with basic subject-verb-object order.
• They are written mostly in present time with occasional and often incorrect use of past or future time.
• Writing tends to be a few simple sentences, often with repetitive structure.
• Vocabulary is limited to common objects and routine activities, and is adequate to express elementary needs.
• Writing is somewhat mechanistic and topics are limited to highly predictable content areas and personal information tied to limited language experience.
• There may be basic errors in grammar, word choice, punctuation, and spelling.
• The writing is understood by natives familiar with the writing of non-natives, although additional effort may be required.
ARA 2411
Intermediate Arabic I
Course Description
The goal of this course is to increase students’ knowledge of the Arabic language and culture through a communication-based (inductive) approach; in other words, although students will be expected to learn grammatical structures, the emphasis will be on functional use of the language, which is context-driven to a considerable extent. Classes will be conducted primarily in Modern Standard Arabic (الفصحى), with an introduction to Moroccan Arabic.
Goals
1. Listening
Understand one utterance at the time in face to face conversation and in routine listening tasks.
Understand highly contextualized messages, state form announcement and simple instructions.
Comprehend messages found in highly familiar everyday context.
Understand information, in minimally connected, sentences and high frequency vocabulary.
2. Speaking
Description, narration, report, Explanation, justification (The use of discourse markers).
Introduce oneself: age – hobbies – jobs – experience – (job related and age related).
Introduce relatives (maternal, paternal, grandparent and partners.
Identify / social activities at Al Akhawayn and in Morocco (university - restaurant – market – stores).
Express personal preferences (hobbies – studies – travel – lodging – trips – urban / rural life).
3. Reading
Recognize the new vocabulary items from the context and rom the different uses.
Understand simple and independent sentences.
Awareness of simple and direct sentence structures.
Familiarity with short and gradually long texts.
The reader as an active participant: create different / various text, use the corpus and expend it according to the need.
4. Writing
Able to write:
o about practical needs.
o Short and simple communication.
o In present tense sentences.
Request information
Basic sentence structure an verb forms.
Write composition and summaries related to work.
Narrate and describe in different time forms
Able to write short text with control of grammar like those of spoken language.
ARA 2412
Intermediate Arabic II
Course Description
The goal of this course is to increase students’ knowledge of the Arabic language and culture through a communication-based (inductive) approach; in other words, although students will be expected to learn grammatical structures, the emphasis will be on functional use of the language, which is context-driven to a considerable extent. Classes will be conducted primarily in Modern Standard Arabic (الفصحى), with an introduction to Moroccan Arabic.
Goals:
By the end of this summer you will إن شاء الله:
5. Listening
Understand one utterance at the time in face to face conversation and in routine listening tasks.
Understand highly contextualized messages, state form announcement and simple instructions.
Comprehend messages found in highly familiar everyday context.
Understand information, in minimally connected, sentences and high frequency vocabulary.
6. Speaking:
Description, narration, report, Explanation, justification (the use of discourse markers).
Introduce oneself: age – hobbies – jobs – experience – (job related and age related).
Introduce relatives (maternal, paternal, grandparent and partners.
Identify / social activities at AlAkhawayn and in Morocco (university - restaurant – market – stores).
Express personal preferences (hobbies – studies – travel – lodging – trips – urban / rural life).
7. Reading
Recognize the new vocabulary items from the context and rom the different uses.
Understand simple and independent sentences.
Awareness of simple and direct sentence structures.
Familiarity with short and gradually long texts.
The reader as an active participant: create different / various text, use the corpus and expend it according to the need.
8. Writing:
Able to write:
o about practical needs.
o Short and simple communication.
o In present tense sentences.
Request information
Basic sentence structure an verb forms.
Write composition and summaries related to work.
Narrate and describe in different time forms
Able to write short text with control of grammar like those of spoken language.
ARA 3411/3412
Advanced
Course Description
The teaching and learning process in this course is communication-based, meaning that the emphasis is placed on functional usage of the language and on communication in context. Preparation of the basic text, including reading of grammatical notes, vocabulary memorization, and spelling, is the student's responsibility. Students should be prepared to answer questions pertaining to the content of the assigned material and use vocabulary in various contexts. Arabic is the only medium of class instruction.
Intended Learning Objectives
By the end of the course, students are expected to have acquired proficiency in the following:
Listening:
• Understand the general and main ideas of authentic audio/visual material on familiar topics introduced within the framework of news programs, political commentaries, interviews, talk shows, live lectures, etc. after the first listening; and
• Understand the supporting details of the main ideas after the second listening.
• Be able to take notes from your listening
• Be able to detect the meaning of words from context and to comprehend the opinion and intentions of the speaker based on contextual clues.
Reading
• Understand the main idea of authentic texts written for general public on familiar topics of interest (after the first reading without relying on the dictionary);
• Understand some supporting details after the second reading;
• Draw conclusions about the author’s attitude (irony, objectivity, enthusiasm ...).
• Use reading strategies (skimming, scanning, making inferences, reading for detail, etc.) appropriate for different types of reading (intensive academic reading, reading for pleasure, etc.);
• Employ analytical reading and critical thinking skills to understand different types of texts;
• Express opinions about an idea, attitude, issue or phenomenon;
• Analyze various organizational and linguistic aspects in a text;
• Evaluate the content and/or the organizational aspects of a specialized article.
Speaking:
• Use MSA to express opinions, describe attitudes and perform academic and functional tasks;
• Develop conversational skills to discuss topics of interest using a variety of language functions (e.g. clarification, description, comparison, reasoning, argumentation, supporting ideas with the appropriate evidence, etc.);
• Express ideas at the paragraph level; and
• Give short presentations (7 to 10 minutes) on topics of choice approved by instructors.
Writing:
• Compose and develop text at the paragraph-length level using a variety of language functions (e.g. clarification, description, comparison, reasoning, argumentation, supporting ideas with the appropriate evidence, etc.); and
Write texts on different topics using the styles and genres appropriate for the purpose of different text types (e.g. letters, articles, narratives, etc.).
ARA 4611
Distinguished
Course Description
ARA 4611 Arabic for special topic: For students who have studied Arabic for 6 to 8 semesters.
This course is designed to students able to:
• Use language skillfully, and with accuracy, efficiency, and effectiveness. They can reflect on wide range of global issues and highly abstract concepts in a culturally appropriate manner.
• Can carry out formal writing tasks such as official correspondence, position papers, and journal articles.
• Can understand a wide variety of texts from many genres including professional technical, academic, and literary.
• Can understand a wide variety of forms, styles, and registers of speech on highly specialized topics in language that is tailored to different audience.
