If you are like most Arabic language learners (including me), then you will probably have run into some or all of these problems:

1. Struggling to pronounce new sounds in Arabic that do not exist in your native language clearly enough for native Arabic speakers to easily understand you, such as
   the ع ain, ح Ha, غ Gayn, ص Sad, ض Dad, ط Ta ,ظ Za, ر ra, etc.

2. Being assigned long texts or dialogues to translate, with little time to build an active vocabulary that you can use in real life

3. Being given lists of Arabic words to memorize that have little direct bearing on your own personal, academic, religious, or professional needs and interests

4. Finding it difficult to remember key words and phrases that bear absolutely no resemblance in pronunciation or structure to English (or whatever native language you speak)

5. Having to recite long passages in Arabic when you do not even really know the meaning of what you are reciting

6. Sitting in classes with large numbers of students, so that the amount of time you spend speaking Arabic is minimized (and replaced by painfully long amounts of time spent listening to your classmates trying to speak Arabic!)

7. Not being able to find anyone that knows Arabic enough and has enough time, commitment, and patience to sit with you and give you the help you need with your Arabic pronunciation and vocabulary

8. Having to pay large amounts of money for a tutor in order to get the one-on-one work you need on your Arabic pronunciation and vocabulary

9. Wasting valuable time on getting to and from the place where you learn Arabic, whether it’s a school, institute, or tutor’s home.

10. Trying to get people around you (if you live in an Arabic-speaking country) to speak with you in Arabic so that you can pick up sounds and words only to have them answer you in English (whether or not English is your native language!)

Apart from the personal frustration that these problems bring, the net result is that according to statistics most Arabic learners do not last longer than several months in their pursuit of the language.  Many do not last longer than a few weeks. 

By far, the vast majority never reach a level of fluency that allows them to really interact with native Arabic speakers in the way that they need to, whether in speech or in writing. 

They limp along with foreign-sounding accents that are difficult to understand.  They can’t comprehend what is being said to them or what they hear on the radio or TV.  They don’t have a hope of being able to read and understand anything written in Arabic unless they have their dictionary with them.  Huge amounts of time and money are spent, with little to show in return.

If you have been trying to learn Arabic for some time, then based on statistics it is likely that what you are reading here is exactly what you have already been experiencing.  If you have not yet started learning Arabic, you are probably thinking “that’s exactly what I would like to avoid!”

I know this from experience. Over the years, I have interacted with hundreds of Arabic learners from every continent, and have found these problems are the norm! 

I began my study of Arabic in 1989 at the University of Toronto, Canada.  In 1991 I went to Cairo, Egypt for two years of intensive Arabic studies, and since that time I have been living in the Arab World.  Unlike some others, I have been able to achieve a high level of proficiency in spoken and written Arabic.  Arabic has become a language that I use each day in my work and in my home.  I do know a few other non-native Arabic speakers who have a higher level of Arabic than I do.  But the truth is that ­most people do not make it this far. 

Thankfully, it is possible to achieve fluency in Arabic, whether in listening, speaking, reading, or writing.  You don’t have to go through all that frustration and end up with little to show for it.  There is a way of learning Arabic that will accelerate your progress incredibly, if you follow it.  I did not make up the method, but I have learned how effective it is and have seen my own Arabic learning jump ahead because of it.  It is neither complex nor difficult, but it is something that is rarely put into practice in a consistent, persistent way!

The key is in the foundation that you build.  Most people who fail at achieving fluency in Arabic do so because they neglect the single most important element in the foundation.  Most language courses and computer programs that teach Arabic push the learner into all kinds of fun and interesting learning activities that do not work, because they are done before a proper foundation has been established.

In the past, people who were gifted in language learning intuitively understood what that foundation is.  Over the past decade, advances in language acquisition research have made it clear to everyone else. 

The most neglected foundation for learning Arabic is building vocabulary.

Vocabulary is not the only element of language learning, but it is the primary, most basic building block on which all other elements can take place.  It’s just like the foundation of a building.  By itself, the foundation doesn’t make a building.  But no construction can take place before the foundation has been properly laid. 

Without a significant base of vocabulary, learners are unable to properly process and benefit from all other types of language input.  This means that increasing your vocabulary should be your number one priority as you approach any language, including Arabic. 

I am not saying that building vocabulary is the only thing you need to do to become fluent in Arabic.  But I am saying  that by giving vocabulary a high priority in your time and effort, you will see a noticeable improvement in many areas of your Arabic learning.   If you think about it, it makes sense – no words, no language.  As  you build a strong foundation of words, you have something on which you can build grammatical structures, sentences, and overall language competency.

When I first began to study Arabic intensively, I was blessed to have a great instructor who understood the powerful influence of vocabulary level on learning Arabic.  His name was Abbas El-Tonsi – one of the authors of the most widely used and acclaimed Arabic textbook series in the world – “Al-kitaab fii Ta'allum Al-'Arabiyya”.  In our class of three students, no matter how overwhelmed we were by the work-load (and it was heavy), he insisted for each and every week of the year that we learn 50 new vocabulary words.  He pushed us tremendously, and in the end it paid off – with an ever-increasing active vocabulary in my brain, stoked week by week with new words, I was able to skip three levels of proficiency when I was placed for my second year.

I am writing from over 18 years of personal experience in learning Arabic.  But it’s not just me who is saying that vocabulary is the foundation. 

If you want to fast-track your Arabic vocabulary acquisition (and in doing so fast-track your entire Arabic learning process), there is now a powerful tool that will help you do so!

The tool you need is a software program called Vocab Clinic®.

It comes in two forms:  Egyptian Arabic Vocab Clinic® and Modern Standard Arabic Vocab Clinic®.  Both packages are published by the American University in Cairo Press.  If you want to build a strong foundation in either of these forms of Arabic, you will want to use this software!  There is also a package called “Modern Standard Arabic Verb Clinic®” that focuses entirely on the correct form and use of verbs in Modern Standard Arabic.

Here’s what the Vocab and Verb Clinic® software can do for you (compare this to the 10 problems experienced by Arabic learners that I wrote about earlier):

1. You will be able to master the difficult sounds of the language that your tongue does not want to pronounce properly, and sound more like a native speaker

2. You will build and retain an active vocabulary that you can use in real life communication

3. You will be able to take control of your own learning process, by focusing on areas and interests that are important to you and the goals you are pursuing

4. You will find yourself more able to hear and understand spoken Arabic as you hear it spoken to you, or on television, radio, movies, etc.

5. You will find yourself understanding more and more of the meaning from context than you could before as you recite difficult passages of Arabic literature

6. You will be able to maximize the amount of time that you spend speaking Arabic and getting direct feedback, rather than waiting for your turn in a class full of other learners

7. You can spend all the time you want hearing a native speaker repeat the words you want to hear back to you (whether it takes two times or two hundred), until you can actually hear the word properly and retain it

8. You will get the one-on-one work you need on your Arabic pronunciation and vocabulary without paying the huge fees that a tutor would take for the same amount of work

9. You will be able to take control of your schedule and save significant amounts of time and energy in transportation to and from a tutor – time that could be used learning Arabic!  Your only commute will be to your computer

10. You will always be able to hear authentic Arabic spoken by native speakers of the language, without having to reciprocate by teaching anyone your native language or any other kind of obligation

Egyptian Arabic Vocab Clinic - Screen Shot

• A digitized library of over 3000 vocabulary items used in everyday life in Egypt (Egyptian Arabic Vocab Clinic®), and over 4000 vocabulary items most commonly used in Modern Standard Arabic (MSA Vocab Clinic®)

• Over 30 categories of words and phrases, allowing you to target your learning

• Your choice of English, Arabic, or Arabic transliteration (Arabic written in Latin letters) as your primary script

• Ability to view all scripts simultaneously

• CD-quality recordings of each word by a native speaker of Arabic, along with wave form plots to provide visual and audio feedback

• Controls that allow you to listen to audio recordings as many times as you need

• Voice recorder that allows you to record and compare your own pronunciation, repeating as often as needed until you get it right

• Informative notes on each word or phrase that help you better understand the cultural and grammatical context

• Ability to write, save, and print your own notes for each word

• Print capabilities that allow you to create fully customized vocabulary practice sheets

Modern Standard Arabic Vocab Clinic - Screen Shot

Vocab Clinic® is simple in concept, but you would be amazed at how little emphasis is given to proper vocabulary acquisition in most Arabic learning courses and programs. 

I discovered this when I first began to study Arabic in 1989.  I was taking a first-year Arabic course at the University of Toronto.  It was by far the most challenging course I took in that first year.  Each day we were given what felt like huge new passages to translate.  I quickly grew frustrated at how little we as a class were able to actually understand, compared to how much we translated!  I found myself spending late nights in one of the small basement libraries of the university, writing up lists of Arabic vocabulary that I would memorize.  That seemed to help me get much more out of class the next day.

Once I arrived in Egypt in 1991 and started studying Arabic full time for two years, vocabulary proved to be such an important part of my Arabic learning experience that developed my own personal system for building it.  I would:

• Read through lists of vocabulary each day, memorizing the meanings
• Record a native Arabic speaker (my friend) saying as many of the words as possible, and listen to them as often as possible
• Record my own voice saying the words, and compare my pronunciation to my friend’s
• Take notes on the way the word or phrase is used
• Make flash-cards for myself that I could carry around

I began this system of mine in 1991, using a note-pad, a pencil, and a small audio cassette recorder.  As you can see, it is a very simple system that laid the foundation for the Vocab Clinic® concept. 

Over the following decade I met many, many Arabic learners that were struggling to learn Arabic and had never realized the key role that vocabulary acquisition plays.  That got me thinking about what it was in my experience that had been different, and I began to try to think of a way to transmit my own system of building Arabic vocabulary. 

I consulted with Arabic instructors, successful language learners (to find out what had worked for them), computer programmers, and multimedia developers.  I brought together a team of teachers, students, data transcribers, voice artists, programmers, and web designers to create a tool that would help people do exactly what I have just described above. 

Egyptian Arabic Vocab Clinic - Screen Shot

As we developed the software, we were approached by a strategic partner, the American University in Cairo (AUC)  – one of the most highly recognized institutions in the word for the teaching of Arabic language to non-Arabic speakers.  AUC Press became the publisher for the software.   The result was Vocab Clinic® - a tool you can use to help you rapidly expand your Arabic vocabulary, and accelerate your progress toward fluency in Arabic. 

Here’s a sample of what other Arabic learners like yourself have to say about Egyptian Arabic Vocab Clinic and Modern Standard Arabic Vocab Clinic:

You can download and  purchase Egyptian Arabic Vocab Clinic® or Modern Standard Arabic Vocab Clinic® for a limited time sale price of $49.97 (normal price $59.97).

Or you can get Modern Standard Arabic Verb Clinic for a limited time price of $58.97 (normal price $78.97)

Click here to purchase and download your copy of Vocab Clinic® or Verb Clinic®

Considering the price of other types of Arabic language instruction, this price is unbeatable for a powerful language tool that will accelerate your Arabic language learning far beyond where it is at now.

Compare this cost to other Arabic language learning options:

The price of one “Al-kitaab fii Ta’allum Al-‘Arabiyaa” textbook – the most widely used textbook for learning Arabic (there are 3 in the series) – is $64.95.  Other textbooks are equally or more expensive. You can get all of the benefits of a complete software package for less than the cost of one textbook.

The average cost of tutoring in Arabic in Egypt, one of the least expensive Arabic speaking countries, runs between $5.00 and $75.00 per hour (costs typically increase in other countries!).  You can get hours and hours of pronunciation practice and listening to CD-quality recordings of a native speaker of Arabic in Vocab Clinic® for the cost of 12 hours of poor quality tutoring, 2 hours of good quality tutoring, or less than one hour of excellent quality tutoring.

The price of access for one month to online course materials for an introductory class in Arabic from an online Arabic academy is $99.00.  You can have unlimited access to all of the Egyptian Arabic or Modern Standard Arabic content of Vocab Clinic for half of that price.

The cost of taking a first year university course of elementary level Arabic ranges from several hundred dollars to several thousand dollars (depending on your institution).  Supplementing your coursework with Vocab Clinic® software to accelerate and increase your speed of learning costs a tiny fraction of the amount you are already paying.

Just in case you are not yet sure about whether or not you would benefit from accelerated Arabic learning through Vocab Clinic®, there are two things that should reassure you at this point:

1. You can download a demo version of the software and see how it works on your own computer before you purchase it.  This demo version is actually the full version of the software, but with restricted access to the Arabic data library.  Once you have downloaded it, if you like what you see, you can purchase a registration key that will unlock it. Visit our Downloads section to do this.

2. Every purchase of downloadable software on this website comes with a full 30 day guarantee.  If you don’t like it, delete it from your computer and email us within 30 days of your purchase and we will give you a 100% refund of your payment, no questions asked.

As you can probably see, I am very confident that you will find this software to be useful to you!

If you are serious about learning Arabic on any level – whether you are just looking for some basic competency for getting around, or you are immersed in a complete Arabic studies program – do what it takes to give yourself the best learning experience possible.

Order Vocab Clinic® now by clicking here to make an online purchase through a secure server. 

Do it now in order to benefit from the special price of $49.97 (regular $59.99) for Vocab Clinic®and $58.97 (regular $79.99) for Verb Clinic®.  This price has been reduced by special agreement with the American University in Cairo Press on a temporary basis, and may or may not be renewed. 

I hope that whether or not you purchase any Vocab Clinic® software, you will find that this article has been of value to you in your journey toward fluency in Arabic!

Best regards,

Andrew Dempsey
Cairo, Egypt

Ps.  Do not hold back on yourself when it comes to maximizing your Arabic learning experience.  Remember that most people who set out to learn it only last a few weeks or months before they quit.  Vocab Clinic® and Verb Clinic® can help you get to where you want to be, faster.

Pps.  Remember, the current pricing of $49.97 and $58.97 is subject to change from our publisher in the future, so order now to ensure your purchase goes through at this price.

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