How to LEARN SPOKEN ARABIC on Your Own Fast

hi my name is Brian Wiles and make comedy videos in Arabic for living... the Big Choice okay so before we get started you're gonna need to make very important decision which dialect of Arabic are you going to learn generally speaking every Arab country has its own unique dialect so there's Egyptian Moroccan Iraqi Etc and then there's MSA or fuss ha which is formal dialect that's used throughout the Middle East now maybe you're thinking if MSA is spoken in every country that's obviously the Smart Choice I'll be able to chat with people no matter where go no definitely not MSA is not spoken dialect of Arabic no one literally no one speaks it in day-to-day life what does that mean well MSA is the version of Arabic that's found in newspapers and in academic texts and it's close ish to the version of Arabic that's found in the Quran but if you try to order coffee in MSA you're gonna sound pretty bizarre so in my opinion if you actually want to speak with other people you're better off learning major regional dialect and later on in this video we'll talk about the two most widely spoken varieties which are Egyptian Arabic and levantine Arabic but if you're interested in learning fusa or different dialect let me know in the comments and will try to talk about them in different video how to start learning on your own you're learning Arabic awesome let's talk about the best way to begin first of all you need to build foundation and by that mean you need to learn the Arabic alphabet and you need to learn to make simple statements and ask simple questions essentially we just need to start wrapping our minds around the way Arabic works now there are few ways to go about doing this one you can use book with an audio guide and I'll put my top recommendations in the description box two you can use an online course in my opinion Pimsleur is the best option if you want to go that route it's what use in the beginning and you can choose between Egyptian Arabic or levantine Arabic which is extremely helpful now look whatever method you use the goals are the same Master the alphabet learn to make simple statements learn to ask simple questions realize that are somewhat vague goal posts but learning language is totally personal process and only you will know when you're ready to move to the next level so pick the method that works best for you get the basics under your belt and when you feel curious to learn more that means it's time to move on to heavy lifting this is the time when you're really building your vocabulary you're getting into the nitty-gritty of adjectives and different tenses and most importantly you're starting to speak Arabic in real conversations first of all at this point we're going to ditch the courses and ditch the textbooks from now on you will learn faster by making your own materials and the best way to do that without doubt is by speaking Arabic with native speaker and asking lots and lots of questions so how do you find native speakers to chat with if you're lucky maybe you know someone personally if not you can hire teacher on italki.com for about twelve dollars an hour and since you're the only student you can ask as many questions as you want and if you don't want to pay twelve dollars you can use an app like hellotalk and do free language Exchange with someone from the Middle East so there you go you have options now let's talk about what exactly you should be doing during those conversations conversation time here is the number one rule in your lessons it's important that you speak as little English as possible force yourself to speak Arabic force yourself to remember words and find workarounds because challenging yourself like that will force your brain to make new connections quickly and you're going to see that you improve very fast now that doesn't mean you want to get frustrated or stress yourself out just go in with disciplined mindset yes sometimes English is going to be unavoidable when you're asking questions but always try to reset to Arabic and during your lessons you want to make sure that you and your teacher have shared Google doc or Google file that you can use to write down new words and definitions so every time you hear something you don't understand you can just ask I'm sorry what was that can you write it down and over time that Google doc is obviously going to grow and that's going to be your new material to study not textbook building your vocab so you're chatting with native speakers you're feeling up Google Docs what now take 10 minutes day and review you can review recent material old material honestly it doesn't matter just review your notes because here's the reality of learning vocab in new language you're going to learn new word or phrase then after while you're going to forget it then you're going to hear it again in three months it sounds Vaguely Familiar you're going to learn it again it sticks little longer this time Etc et cetera et cetera it's subconscious process but if you stick with it one day you will just know that word or phrase without even thinking about it and that's exactly what we want you don't have to think of word it's just there that's fluency now look used to be big believer in spaced repetition and flash cards but I've come to the conclusion that for most people flash cards are just too boring you need to keep your motivation alive learning language like Arabic needs to be an enjoyable process or you're probably going to give up so now take more holistic view have conversations take notes review them for 10 minutes day however you do that if you do it consistently you'll improve fast self-study essential as you practice speaking Arabic with other people you also need resources that will help you keep learning on your own what resources podcasts in Arabic now there's bit of jump here in terms of complexity but don't worry we're going to talk about the method and then will give you some specific resources that recommend the goal here is to listen carefully to Native audio and you can do that via podcasts or you can watch and listen to videos personally prefer podcasts because the sound quality tends to be little sharper and can walk around outside while do it and I'm not stuck in front of screen have video that talks about this in more depth you can check it out right there basically you're going to listen to to or watch your material and every time you hear word that you don't know you're going to write it down on your laptop your phone your notebook whatever if you can write that note in Arabic if not you can write rough approximation of the Sounds in the Roman alphabet and at the start of your next lesson you're going to ask your teacher to explain what that word means and write down the definition that's it but to be clear would not recommend using dictionary to do this there are some decent online dictionaries for Egyptian and levantine Arabic again I'll put information below but you really want to make sure that your teacher is explaining to you how people use these words and phrases in context because it can vary widely from what you'll find in the dictionary so now let's talk about some podcasts and audio material that recommend listening to Egyptian Arabic listening resources language transfer this is completely free audio course on Soundcloud it's mostly in English but the hosts do great job of explaining grammar points and teaching useful phrases in Egyptian Arabic Arabi is textbook series for learning Egyptian Arabic but all of the dialogues are available on Soundcloud and there are five levels so you can work your way up over time the the Russo online podcast this is native Egyptian podcast about Career Development so there's obviously jump in terms of complexity but just take it slow listen to small chunks at time and try to pick out as many words as you can isn't that Jose this is comedy podcast about all kinds of different topics marriage work Sports Etc it's very well produced and it will give you fun window into Egyptian culture levantine Arabic listening resources the simple and easy Arabic podcast the hosts on this show read short stories in levantine Arabic and they speak very slowly and clearly would highly recommend it the Arabic we speak this site hosts an entire library of short audio segments in levantine Arabic and there are range of levels to choose from but if you want to listen to all the material you do need subscription the Saturday after dinner podcast this is very Cosmopolitan Lebanese talk show the hosts discuss all kinds of cultural issues and the conversations are pretty complex but if you look up the show on YouTube you can also find captions in English reaching fluency so you're making conversation regularly you're reviewing your notes you're listening to Native podcasts but how do you break through and become fluent well first of all fluency means different things to different people but for me it's the ability to understand other people and express yourself comfortably in given language and to do that you really need to step outside your comfort zone because at this level one of the biggest challenges you'll face is fear fear of saying the wrong thing fear of not knowing what to say fear of not understanding what someone else is saying and in my opinion the only way to get past that fear is to confront it head on and acknowledge that making mistakes is totally natural it's part of the process and trust me when it comes to learning Arabic people will be so thrilled you're making an effort they won't care how many mistakes you make so get creative maybe you seek out an Arabic speaking community in your area yeah or maybe you start making content online and ask for feedback or maybe you plan trip to the Middle East and commit to speaking in your new language when you get there honestly just get out there and keep finding ways to challenge yourself because learning Arabic will unlock an amazing part of the world for you and introduce you to some of the richest cultures and warmest people on the planet so just keep going promise you'll be glad you did as we say in Arabic without feet