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Arabic learning should begin at home: Dr. Abdullah Al Danan

Most people, he said, are reluctant to read as they think written Arabic is the toughest language in the world.

Lack of reading in Arabic language has pushed the Arab world backward, said Dr. Abdullah Al Danan, a renowned linguistic expert and inventor of the theory “Natural Teaching Method of Classic Arabic Language”.

He delivered a speech on “How to teach Classic Arabic naturally” in the city hall at Dubai Municipality headquarters.

The programme was organized by the Arabic Language Team and presided by Rashad Bukhash, Director of Architectural Heritage Department at Dubai Municipality and the Head of Arabic Language Team.

Al Danan said the basic reason behind the overall backwardness of the Arab world is due to the lack of reading. Most of the people, he said, are reluctant of reading as they think the written Arabic is the toughest language in the world, to the extent that the individual reading ratio of Arabs is only one book for 70 people per year, while each individual in European countries reads more than 40 general books per year.

"In fact, though the structure and rules of Arabic is totally different from other languages, it is one of the easiest languages in the world. It is our approach that made its written script difficult to understand for the majority of people," he said.

"Children who naturally learned the pure Arabic from their parents and teachers before reaching 10 years of age are always toppers in reading, writing and understanding the language as well as distinguishing in other subjects and making decisions throughout their life," he explained based on his own personal experiences.

Al Danan showed a video taken 35 years back with his son Basil when he was only three years and seven months old, in which Basil speaks the pure Arabic without even a single mistake in grammar without knowing the basic lessons of grammar.

He also said that there is no need to waste time teaching Arabic grammar if we teach them to speak in classic Arabic in this period, because the ability to naturally grasp languages will be suddenly withdrawn by God after 10 years. After 10 years, a person who wishes to learn any language should learn its rules at least in basic levels.

"Children can speak many languages at a time if we talk to them without mistakes. I established a kindergarten in my home country and appointed seven native speakers of different languages. The result was amazing, that all kids were able speak seven different languages as their mother tongue within two years," he said.

According to him, the Arab world respects the Arabic language because of its strong link with the Holy Quran, otherwise they would have called for eliminating this beautiful language from the earth because of our unscientific approach towards it.

The only way to protect and improve Arabic language is to start from the childhood with help of qualified and trained instructors in the primary level classes. In addition, the parents should speak the pure language at home without feeling coyness in that.

"We are undergoing through a saddest tragedy in the history of Arabs which has contributed billions of scientific, literature and religious books to the whole world and now our new generations are not even able to understand this language and thereby the beauty of its literature," he added.

And the worst scenario is that the hundreds of nationalities who live with us are never able to learn or understand our language as we developed a new version of Asian Arabic to speak with them which is a mix of different Asian languages and broken English.

He urged the municipality to take necessary steps to strengthen Arabic ensuring the quality of language in all its communications and appreciated its different initiatives to protect and spread the language such as the Arabic language team and courses of non-Arabic speakers, etc.

Rashad Bukhash thanked Dr. Danan for his wonderful lecture and promised to implement his suggestions by motivating employees to speak ‘Fus-ha’ (pure) language.

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