Grammatical Terms - what do they mean?

Incase you have not learned a language before, maybe you never had any need to understand exactly what is a verb, noun, adjective etc. If that is the case, I hope this thread will be a useful reference for you insha allah.

The parts of speech

Noun - a noun is a thing. It may be referred to as a "naming word" such as "table" "floor" "banana" "Mohammed" etc

Pronoun - a pronoun is a word that is used in place of a noun. In English they are words such as "he" "she" "we" "it"

Adjective - a "describing word" such as "green" "nice" "old" "interesting"

Verb - a verb is a "doing word" such as "run" "eat" "look" "write". It must be changed slightly depending who is doing the action, like in English we say "I write" but "he writes"

Adverb - a word describing how a word is done, such as "quickly" "efficiently"

Preposition - a word which shows where something is, eg "in" "under"

Equational sentence - a sentence following the pattern of "something is something" [made up of a subject and a predicate: ]

The subject here is basically what the sentence is about. We could say it is the topic of the sentence. When we say "The house is big.", the sentence is telling us something about the house, so the house is known as the subject.

The predicate is simply a word which tells us something about the subject. "Big" in the above sentence is the predicate because it is telling us about the house.

Verbal sentence - a sentence with a verb (doing word) in it. It always has a subject, and usually has an object

Subject - the subject of the verbal sentence is always a noun.The subject is the person or thing that is doing the action eg in the sentence "I saw Sajid", I am the subject.

Object - The object has an action done to it, in the above sentence, Sajid is the object.

Other words derived from verbs

Active Participle - The person who does the action of that verb. If the verb was "write" then the activer participle is "writer"

Passive participle - The thing that has had the action done to it. If the verb was "choose" then the passive participle is "chosen"

Verbal noun - this is a naming word that had its origin in a verb. Often it names a concept rather than a specific thing. An example of this is the word "smoking" in the sentence "Smoking is bad for you."

Vocabularies

The Face

الوجه

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Days Of The Week

أيام الأسبوع

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Saturday السبت
Sunday الأحد
Monday الأثنين
Tuesday الثلاثاء
Wednesday الأربعاء
Thursday الخميس
Friday الجمعة

New vocabulary given in this lesson

The first seven words are essential for this lesson. Please try to memorize them insha allah. The others will also be useful for the exercises.

هذا
(haadha) This [masculine]
هذه
(haadhihi) This [feminine]
ذلك
(dhaalika) That [masculine]
تلك
(tilka) That [feminine]
ما
(maa) what?
من
(man) who?
هل
(hal) Is...? [question particle]
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أمّ

(umm) mother
طالب
(Taalib) student
مفتاح
(miftaah) key
وردة
(warda) rose
كلب
(kalb) dog
قطّة
(qitta) cat
قلم

pen

2.) Choose the right word to go with each name. (The blue names are boys names and the pink names are girls names)

هذا /هذه محمد

ذلك/ تلك ليلى

ذلك/ تلك عائشة

هذا/ هذه علي

هذا/ هذه نورة

3.) Translation exercises
English to Arabic

1.) This is a cat
2.) That is a dog
3.) Is this a mosque?
4.) That is a key
5.) Is this Saara? No, this is Layla
6.) Is this student hardworking?
7.) This boy is hardworking
8.) That boy is Ali
9.) That is a kitchen
10.) Who is this? This is Mohammed
__________________

Is this a...?

To ask questions of the format "Is this a house?" we take the statement "this is a house" in arabic and add the word هل to the beginning.

هذا بيت
(haadha bayt) This is a house
هل هذا بيت؟
(hal haadha bayt?) Is this a house?

هذه الأمّ مسلمة
(haadhihi al umm muslima) This mother is muslim
هل هذه الأمّ مسلمة؟
(hal haadhihi al umm muslima?) Is this mother muslim?

To answer this question, we need the following words :

نعم = yes (na3am)
لا = no (laa)

Look at the following examples:

هل هذا بيت؟
(hal haadha bayt?) Is this a house?
لا, هذا مسجد
(laa, haadha masjid) No, this is a mosque

هل هذه الأمّ مسلمة؟
(hal haadhihi al umm muslima?) Is this mother Muslim?
نعم, هذه الأمّ مسلمة
(na3am, haadhihi al umm muslima) Yes, this mother is Muslim

Asking what or who things are

The word for "what" in this context is ما .
Remember we are not using any word for "is" so simply put ما in front of haadha / dhaalika / haadhihi / tilka

The word for "who" in this context is من

Remember we are not using any word for "is" so simply put من infront of haadha / dhaalika / haadhihi / tilka

Use ما when asking about non humans, and من when asking about humans.

Examples

ما هذا؟ هذا قلم
(maa haadha? haadha qalam) what is this? this is a pen

من هذه؟ هذه نورة
(man haadhihi? haadhihi Noura) Who is this? This is Noura

ما ذلك؟ ذلك بيت
(maa dhaalika? dhaalika bayt) what is that? that is a house

ما تلك؟ تلك سيّارة
(maa tilka? tilka sayyaara) what is that? that is a car

من هذا؟ هذا يوسف
(man haadha? haadha yousef) who is this? This is Yousef

This boy is...

To expand on this, you may also want to say, for example "This boy is Rashid" rather than simply "This is Rashid". So, how do make the change between "This is a boy." and "This boy is..." ? Look at the examples below and spot the difference.

هذا ولد

Haadha walad.This is a boy

هذا الولد

Haadha al walad...This boy

As you can see, the difference is that "al" appeared. [As will learn and practice in the next lesson], "AL" is an Arabic "definate article" (ie it means "The"). In English when we say "This boy" we know which boy is being talking about, it is a defininate boy - This boy, not just any boy. That is the logic behind the inclusion of "AL" study the following examples :

هذا طالب
(haadha Taalib) This is a student

هذا الطالب مجتهد
(haadha aT Taalib mujtahid) This student is hard working

ذلك ولد
(dhaalika walad) That is a boy

ذلك الولد طالب
(dhaalika al walad Taalib) That boy is a student

هذه أمّ
(haadhihi Umm) This is a mother

هذه الأمّ مسلمة
(haadhihi al Umm muslima) This mother is Muslim

تلك مسلمة
(tilka muslima) That is a Muslim lady

تلك المسلمة عائشة
(tilka al muslima Aisha)

LESSON THREE

In this lesson will we learn and practise how to form short sentences such as "this is a boy" and "that is a house".



There is quite alot to learn in this lesson. You may wish to study the lesson in parts doing the relevant exercises as you go along, or read and study the whole lesson and then proceed to all of the exercises.



These are described grammatically as "equational sentences" and do not need any word for "is".



This is... and That is...



To say "This is..." you take the word هذاand then simply add the name of the thing or personTo say "That is...." you take the word ذلك and then simply add the name of the thing or personIf the thing is feminine [eg Umm(mother) or Muslimah (female muslim)] then swap the word هذا for هذهAnd ذلك for تلك (Differences with masculine and feminine words will be dealt with in its own lesson later).

EXAMPLES

هذا ولد
(haadha walad) This is a boy

Although you just add the word for "this" and the word for "boy" it does not mean "this boy" it means "this IS a boy".

هذا قلب
(haadha qalb) This is a heart
هذا محمّد
(haadha Mohammed) This is Mohammed

ذلك بيت
(dhaalika bayt) That is a house

ذلك مطبخ
(dhaalika matbakh) That is a kitchen

ذلك عليّ
(dhaalika Ali) That is Ali

هذه أمّ
(haadhihi umm) This is a mother

هذه ليلى
(haadhihi Layla) This is Layla

تلك مسلمة
(tilka muslima) That is a muslim lady

تلك عائشة
(tilka Aisha) That is Aisha