The Connectors in Modern Standard Arabic Review

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(More customer reviews)This book is organized into 27 lessons, each covering some 3-8 connectors. By connectors, the authors mean the various particles that serve to conjoin two or more verbs, nouns, phrases, clauses, sentences, etc. Some simple examples in English would be "and", "but", and "or". Some more complex examples are "as for", "in order to", "provided that", and "in connection with". The premise of this book is that such constructions aren't covered adequately in most Arabic-language textbooks. I agree, but I would point out that this is also true of other languages besides Arabic. In fact, I believe a similar book for the English language would be quite a useful reference for students and writers.
This book is an excellent review text for someone who has studied Arabic before whether their level is advanced or intermediate. If you've ever had the frustrating experience of understanding almost every word in a paragraph yet still not comprehending the overall meaning, this book will do wonders for your reading comprehension.
Beginners could also benefit from a book of this type if the examples were translated, which they are not. This is unfortunate and should perhaps be remedied in a future edition.

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Most Arabic textbooks concentrate on morphology and syntax, but while these provide the indispensable structural base, students still find there is a wide gap between their theoretical knowledge and their practical ability to write connected prose. This unique textbook concentrates on the connectors (those articles, phrases, or idioms which join words, phrases, clauses, or sentences) in a functional setting with the aim of developing and improving the writing skills of intermediate and advanced students of Arabic as a foreign language. Each lesson of The Connectors begins with a presentation of the structures, followed by a sample text and sample sentences, before moving on to a graded series of exercises. The book contains twenty-seven lessons, including five review lessons, and a sample test at the end.

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501 Arabic Verbs: Fully Conjugated in All Forms Review

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(More customer reviews)Used together with Hans Wehr's indispensable dictionary, this book is very useful for the intermediate learner of Arabic. However, the lack of English indexing is extremely frustrating. In short, it's definitely worth having until the next edition comes out - hopefully with a much-improved index.
PROS:
1. Each of the 501 verbs is conjugated neatly in its 65 different forms according to:
- person (1st, 2nd, and 3rd)
- number (singular, dual, plural)
- gender (feminine and masculine)
- voice (active and passive)
- mood (perfect (maadhi), imperfect (marfoo'a), subjunctive (mansoob), jussive (majroor), imperative (amr))
- active participle (sighat al-fa'il), passive participle (sighat al-maf'ool), and verbal noun (masdar)
These are all the forms that Arabic professors expect you (as an intermediate or advanced student) to know off the top of your head, but that few of us can actually recite perfectly - especially for weak verbs, hollow verbs, etc. So it's great having it all in once place as a reference. Even for the beginner, seeing all of this laid out for each verb in one place will give you a good visual schema for how Arabic verbs work.
2. Each verb comes with three or four example sentences using different forms of the verb in context. Very helpful if you're trying to learn new verbs.
3. Each verb comes with its verb pattern (wazn, I to X) and root (jadhr). The book is alphabetized by jadhr, just like Hans Wehr. The verbs are also indexed at the back of the book alphabetically in Arabic as well (i.e. by spelling of the pattern of the verb listed, not just by root).
4. Unlike some other reviewers, I don't find the type to be too small. It's fine. A lot of Arabic texts are written in smaller print than this anyway.
CONS:
1. Although each verb comes with the English meaning, there is no way to look up a verb by its English meaning without flipping through the entire book. This quickly becomes really annoying. It would have taken the publisher a couple of hours and added only a few pages to the end of the book to include an index of the 501 verbs by English definition. This is by far the biggest problem with the book. Without this problem, this would be a five-star book. The way it is, it's about 3 1/2 stars.
2. Although the verbs are indexed at the back of the book and numbered 1-501, page numbers aren't listed to lead you to the verb. Even worse, although the index tells you what verb #70 (out of 501) is, there's no #70 written next to the verb in the body of the book! So the index numbering is completely useless. A big oversight.
3. To make this book even better, it would help to have (a) the plural of the verbal noun (masdar) listed (since these are often irregular) and (b) the prepositions that are used with each verb. I find that I have to look to the example sentences to sort out which preposition comes after each verb, and sometimes that doesn't even clear up the question.
4. There are a few typos to watch out for - I've noticed a couple of sukkuns that should actually be hamzas. But this is a very minor gripe - it's almost 100% correct as far as I can tell.

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Barron's 501 Arabic Verbs is printed in Arabic script with exemplary sentences in English for each verb. To reflect correct Arabic style, 501 Arabic Verbs has been printed back cover to front and back page to front. Verbs are arranged alphabetically in a table format, one verb per page with English translation, and conjugated in all tenses and forms. The book's additional features include common idioms with example sentences to demonstrate verb usage and a grammar review.

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Alif Baa with DVDs: Introduction to Arabic Letters and Sounds Review

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(More customer reviews)I used Alif Baa (with DVDs) in Arabic 101 at the University of Maryland (Baltimore County) and it's probably the best beginner book I have encountered. The DVDs are great and add a lot to the text and exercises. It even shows a chart with the letters, and you can click on the appropriate character to hear and show someone pronouncing it in several different voices. Great idea. Lots of exercises to listen to and write down. And, for $5, there's an answer key to Alif Baa which will help an awful lot if you want to teach yourself.

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Newly revised and packaged with two DVDs containing both audio and video exercises, Alif Baa with DVD: Introduction to Arabic Letters and Sounds, is the first part of the Al-Kitaab program. It teaches learners to recognize and produce both letters and sounds accurately through a variety of exercises designed to develop listening, reading, and writing skills. In addition, it introduces about 150 basic vocabulary words in authentic contexts, and it includes video footage of an Arabic calligrapher, a large collection of street signs, social greetings, capsules on Arab culture, and an English-Arabic glossary.

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