University of Maryland, College Park

ARABIC 105: First Year Arabic II

Instructor: lutf Alkebsi Office: SQH 2101 E Office Hours: Email: lalkebsi@umd.edu Classroom: SQH 1111 Time: MWF

Course Materials:
1. Al-Kitaab fii Tacallum al- cArabiyya, Part 1 (Third Edition) by Brustad, Al-Batal & Al-Tonsi. 2. The Hans Wehr Dictionary of Modern Written Arabic, edited by J.M. Cowan. 3. Course book website: www.alkitaabtextbook.com. You will complete a large percentage of your homework online at this site. Your teacher will provide you with details of how to register and log on. 4. CANVAS: In this class we will use CANVASa web-based course management system at elms.umd.edu to distribute course materials, communicate online, post and submit assignments, and post grades. Visit

CANVAS regularly to check your grades as they accumulate.

Learning Outcomes:
By the end of Arabic 105 you will, in-shaa'a-llaah: 1. be able to sustain conversation on daily-life topics at the intermediate level of proficiency in both formal Arabic and at least one spoken dialect as appropriate to context. 2. be able to comprehend the general meaning of simple authentic written and oral texts; be able to extract specific details appropriate to the intermediate level; and be confident and competent in forming hypotheses about parts you do not fully understand. 3. be able to type paragraphs about a variety of simple every-day topics; and have developed the study habit of activating new vocabulary learned as you write. 4. comprehend and accurately produce the basic sentence structures of Arabic. 5. be aware of and use culturally important expressions used among friends and acquaintances. 6. be further aware of aspects of Arab culture that form the cultural background of an average native speaker.

Grade Distribution:
Preparation and participation in class Homework Writing Corrections Voice recordings Tests
[1]

10% 15% 15% 5% 10% 15%

Skits Final presentation Final Exam

10% 5% 15%

Grade Distribution/Course Requirements in Detail:

Note: All assignments are due at the start of class on the due date. 1. Participation in class (10%): Class time will be devoted to activating the vocabulary and structures that you have prepared at home through your homework, and to building your skills in speaking, listening and reading. You should expect to spend at least 75% of class time doing activities in pairs and small groups. Active participation in class is essential to making good language proficiency gains and doing well in the class. This part of your grade will be based on a weekly participation grade assigned by your instructor and posted on CANVAS. It is your responsibility to check your grade and to seek feedback on how you can do better if necessary. ARAB105 is taught in Arabic. It is not a class about Arabic taught in English. The language policy for the class is as follows: Students are required to speak Arabic from the moment they enter the classroom (not from the moment teaching begins) until the moment they leave. This will create an Arabic-only zone. If English is needed on some rare occasion, the student must ask for permission to speak in English (and your teacher will do the same). The logic behind this is that in addition to building your language skills, the class will train you to: cope with uncertainty without freaking out. develop strategies to check your understanding. become comfortable with spontaneous interaction in Arabic early in your language education. overcome the novelty of Arabic, and operate in the reality. Dont Think: This is ridiculous, we are not ready, how they can expect us to understand what is happening? Do Think: Well, I may not always understand what is happening, but my teacher is trained to make it clear, and I will develop both listening and speaking skills more quickly as a result. The language policy is only successful when the whole group implements it. Do not be the student who ruins the learning experience for everyone by blurting out a sentence in English. Help each other to stay on task in Arabic. Remember that when you help someone by yapping away English, you are taking away their opportunity to figure it out themselves based on the Arabic input. This means you are bad. Really really bad. Your participation in class will be graded according to the following criteria: 5- You are actively engaged in developing your Arabic proficiency and communicating in Arabic with your partner/classmates/teachers from the moment you walk into the class until you leave it. Full credit will be given when you, i. are ready to start class on time, which means that you are in your seat, you have submitted your homework, you have put your phone on silent, and you have taken everything you need for class out of your bag. Running through the door the second before class begins will not earn you full credit for participation.

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ii.

iii.

iv. v. vi. vii.

speak exclusively in Arabic from the moment you arrive until the moment you leave, unless you seek permission to speak in English. An uncontrolled outburst in English automatically results in a lower participation grade for that class period. are well prepared for the class, which means that you have listened to recorded materials on the accompanying web site/DVD, learned the new vocabulary, read the grammar explanations carefully and done the homework drills based on these explanations before coming to class you submit fully completed homework at the beginning of class are alert participate actively when we are working together as a class make maximum use of pair/group work time by a) understanding the learning objectives of tasks assigned b) staying focused on those objectives c) continuing to work with your partner on the task objectives even if you finish an assigned task before the allotted time is up (Ask your instructor for additional instructions if you arent sure what to do next).

Attendance policy: A large part of the progress that we hope you will make in this course rests on your regular participation in class activities. If you are not present in class, even if you manage to keep up with the assigned homework, you will not be able to activate what you have learned. For this reason, students who miss more than five classes without providing documentation that satisfactorily excuses their absence will receive an F for the class . See the university policies below for more on what constitutes an excused absence. Classroom Conduct Policies: Use of laptops and cell phones is not permitted. Please do not chew gum or eat in class this is a language class and you cant talk with your mouth full. 2. Homework Assignments (15%) To prepare for the learning that takes place through practice in class, you will listen, read and study new material at home. This material will not be presented in class. We will assume that you know it (not that you are aware of it). If you dont, this indicates that you have not done your homework to the required standard. The amount of effort you put into your at-home preparation and your homework is an important part of your homework grade. Pay close attention to your instructors comments on your assignments, and follow up promptly in office hours or after class if you have questions about your homework grade. Late homework assignments will not be accepted. Your homework grade for a given day will incorporate both the HW that you are required to submit, and the HW that you are required to complete online before class. If you do not do the online HW before class, you will not receive credit. If you are absent from class you may submit homework via email BEFORE the class, but not during or after class. If you are absent from class for a documented medical absence, you may submit missed homework at the start of class on the day you return. No late homework will be accepted after this time. Please note that this is a program policy that your teacher is required to follow. Do not embarrass your teacher by asking him or her to flout this policy for you. Homework assignments will be rated on a scale of 1 to 5 (5= excellent; 4= good; 3= mediocre; 2= poor; 1= very poor work). The homework schedule will be available on canvas. Sometimes an exercise from al-kitaab asks you to listen or read and take notes or answer questions. You should complete these exercises in order to be prepared for class, but you do not always need to submit them (remember that your teacher will know if you are not prepared for class and this will be reflected in your participation grade). Homework which must be written on paper and submitted is marked in the schedule with lit-tasliim ( )for submission. Xerox copies from the textbook will

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not be accepted. Using the answer key in doing the homework is a violation of the Honor Code and will be treated accordingly. On each homework assignment: 1. write your name in Arabic 2. write the date that it is due (not the date you are doing it) 3. staple pages together 4. leave room for feedback from your instructors on the homework. Failure to do any of the above will lower your homework grade by point. A note on HW: Some homework assignments involve listening to a recording and writing down the sentences that you hear. Each sentence contains a new vocabulary item. Some students may feel frustrated that they have to write a complete sentence just for one new word. Others feel frustrated when they get the word right, but make a mistake elsewhere in the sentence, and then still have to do corrections. These students dont understand the aim of the exercise, which is (in part) to train you to listen to tiny details that may affect meaning, and to use what you know about the relationships between words to compensate when your listening skills let you down. For example, you may think you hear , but you know that this must be wrong, so just writing what you think you hear would be a mistake. You need to use your grammatical knowledge here, to write , and then figure out where that rogue /a/ sound is coming from. Could it be the beginning of the following word? Students who get the point that they should be fully aware of what they are writing usually do better at this type of exercise than those who just mechanically write what they hear, even though they dont understand it. What is the point of that? 3. Writing (15%) You will complete 8 writing assignments in this course. These will be graded according to a grading rubric. Details of the assignments and how they will be graded can be found on CANVAS (just click the title of the assignment). Writing is not marked on the weekly schedule, because it is obvious that you need to hand it in. 4. Corrections (5%) Mistakes are a natural part of the learning process, but you can only truly benefit from them when you take the time to revise your work and correct your mistakes. Your instructor will use a simple code on your homework and writing assignments to mark errors in writing/spelling, and grammar (see the document correction symbols on CANVAS), and you will correct the errors on the same sheet of paper using a different color ink. Please do the following. At the top of the page, write corrections and the date that they are due. Make your corrections using a different color ink (next to the original error). Submit the corrected HW or writing at the beginning of class. Late corrections will not be accepted. The only time you do not need to do corrections is if you see NCR (No Corrections Required) written at the top of your original. Getting a 5 for a HW does not mean that you do not have corrections. If you get an NCR, your teacher will automatically give you a 5 for the corrections for that particular HW. Corrections are marked on the weekly schedule. 5. Voice Recordings (10%) When you see "on your weekly homework schedule, this means that you are required to go to CANVAS, and record yourself speaking. You should prepare for this beforehand by choosing the language that you

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are going to use, and practicing a few times before you record. Some exercises that you are asked to record consist of asking questions. For these, you should choose the questions to ask, and you should also record your answer to those questions. Your recording will be graded on both accuracy, and on how much of an effort you make to use new vocabulary and grammar that you have studied. Click the recording assignment on CANVAS to get started.

6. Tests (15%) There will be two tests during the semester. They will test your progress towards achieving some or all of the learning outcomes presented above. It is extremely unlikely that you will be permitted to take a make-up test. Requests for a make-up must be approved by the course coordinator. Test grades are usually a good indicator of how you are doing in the class. If you are not doing well on tests, talk to your instructor to get suggestions for strategies to improve your performance. 7. Skits (5 %): Throughout the course you will be asked to prepare and submit three recorded skits with a partner. Skits provide you with the opportunity to show what you have learned and what you can create with the language. Further information about each skit's format and method of evaluation is available on CANVAS (just click the skit assignment to read more). 8. Final Presentation (5%) You will give a final presentation in class at the end of the course. Details of how the presentation will be graded are available on CANVAS. 10. Final Examination: (15%) The final examination will test the extent to which you have met the learning outcomes for the course. It will be designed to reward students who have worked consistently hard throughout the course and have made considerable gains as a result. It will not be a simple test of material we have covered, but a test of the students language skills, including ability to guess meaning, make hypotheses, and cope with uncertainty. No make-up tests will be given. Please do not make travel plans before you know when your final exam will be. The date and time of the final exam is firm and may be found here:

http://registrar.umd.edu/current/registration/exam.html University Policies: 1. Students with disabilities should contact the instructor at the beginning of the semester to discuss any accommodation for this course. 2. The University has approved a Code of Academic Integrity (http://www.shc.umd.edu/code.html) which prohibits students from cheating on exams, plagiarizing papers, submitting the same paper for credit in two courses without authorization, buying papers, facilitating academic dishonesty, submitting fraudulent documents, and forging signatures. Plagiarism policy: all quotations taken from other authors, including from the Internet, must be indicated by quotation marks and referenced. Paraphrasing must be referenced as well. The following University of Maryland Honor Pledge, approved by the University Senate, should be handwritten and signed on the front page of all papers, projects or other academic assignments submitted for evaluation in this course: "I pledge on my honor that I have not given or received any unauthorized assistance on this assignment/examination."

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3. As of fall 2012, the University has adopted adopt a new policy on plus/minus grading. The new edition of the Catalog reflects this policy that 1. Students must earn a grade of C- or higher in each course counted toward a major, minor or certificate. 2. Students matriculating in fall 2012 or later must earn a cumulative GPA of 2.0 within the major (or minor or certificate) in order to graduate. See detailed implementation plan for the new policy on plus/minus grading: http://www.testudo.umd.edu/plusminusimplementation.html 4. Religious observance: Please inform your instructor of any intended absences for religious observance at least two weeks in advance.

5. Course evaluations are a part of the process by which the University of Maryland seeks to improve teaching and learning. Your participation in this official system is critical to the success of the process. All information submitted to CourseEvalUM is confidential. Instructors can only view group summaries of evaluations and cannot identify which submissions belong to which students. 6. Absences from class due to the illness of a student: (a) Students missing a single class (one time per semester) due to illness must provide a self-signed note attesting to the date of illness. The note must also contain an acknowledgement by the student that the information is true and correct and that providing false information is prohibited under Code of Student Conduct. The student is also obligated to make a reasonable attempt to inform the instructor of his/her illness in advance. Note: A self-signed note does not apply to a Major Scheduled Grading Event such as previously scheduled exams, tests, quizzes, final and/or take-home exams as listed on the course syllabus or announced in class prior to the date of illness. (b) Prolonged absence or illness preventing attendance from class requires written documentation from the Health Center and/or health care provider verifying dates of treatment and time(s) when student was unable to meet academic responsibilities. 7. This syllabus may be subject to change. Students will be notified in advance of important changes that could affect grading, assignments, etc. 8. Unless otherwise directed, students are expected to remain in the classroom for 15 minutes in the unlikely event that the instructor should not arrive on time. After 15 minutes, it may be assumed that class will not be held.

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