Each chapter (or unit) is then sub-divided into the following areas, in repeated

sequence for each unit:

Pre-reading: Students are provided with a photo and vocabulary in Arabic text with
English translation (no more than about ten terms). This exercise is about preempting or predicting the nature of the exercises about to follow; getting students
thinking about and discussing their predictions.

Reading for main ideas: this is about reading the opening paragraph of a news
article to extract key ideas: where, what, who, when and why. Students are provided
with a short text plus key vocab items (less than ten) in Arabic and English and a list
of main issues to extract, indicated in Arabic. For example in the first unit the main
issues are "the kind of meeting", "place of the meeting", "the participants", "the
subject of discussion". The student is given a sequence of about half a dozen similar
exercises each covering the subject but building on and expanding the knowledge in
the previous exercise.

Understanding text organization: This section provides a media example then points
(with arrows) at key terms to extract the "What, Why and Where" to teach students
about archetypical sentence and paragraph structures - thus accelerating the ability
to extract key issues from a text. The section then provides tables of standard
vocabulary, prepositions and expressions used in media articles. These tables
provide more than a flat translation but rather provide expanded contextual
meaning that a native reader would comprehend but that won't always be apparent
to a student. I found this to be extremely useful, for example, in providing a dual
translation of connectors: you get the literal translation and a contextual translation
which shows what is indicated by the choice of connector.

Reading for detail: provides several, denser, examples of text and asks the student
to identify key points then make summaries and answer more detailed questions
about content.

Vocabulary building: A series of exercises including building network diagrams of

vocabulary, cutting out and scrapbooking newspaper images with student-chosen
vocab, creating lists of vocab associated with a supplied image and various
exercises in which the student must select terms from a list to fill in the blanks of
various text examples. Finally, the student is provided with photos and a list of

vocab items and must write a descriptive paragraph making use of the supplied
vocab.

Skimming: the student is given texts and asked to read quickly and draft a title that
summarises the piece. This is an exercise that would need a teacher to be of most
use, in assessing the success or otherwise of the student's interpretation.

Critical reading: this is a very interesting section as it asks the reader to compare
multiple reporting of events and detect opinions and biases of the writers through
the terms chosen to describe events. As the book progresses the reader is given
specific vocab examples (i.e., "mafroud") to show that word choice is a key to
understanding the possible position of the author.

Each of these units, as noted, follows the same pedagogical pattern. This ensures
that an expected familiar pattern exists in order to aid and compound the learning,
but there is such a diversity of exercises that there is never any chance of the
student (whether self-taught or under instruction) finding the process tedious.

This is quite simply one of the best learning tools for an intermediate to upperintermediate student of Arabic. I would recommend this purchase along with Jabra F.
Ghneim's Ace My Language - Arabic Edition and Shukri Abed's Focus on
Contemporary Arabic (Conversations with Native Speakers). Indeed, if I was
studying Arabic at college, that trio of texts would make up a terrific curriculum for
intermediate students. I certainly wish I had a book like this five years ago.
6 of 6 people found the following review helpful
DLPT material 13 Dec 2010
By Hunyadi - Published on Amazon.com
Format: Paperback Verified Purchase
If you're a DLI-FLC expatriate and are a no stranger to the MSA DLPT, get this book!
It's very helpful with the everyday used MSA words from Al-Jazeera, BBC Arabic, etc.
Highly recommended book to increase your media-related vocabulary for the DLPT.
Great self study-aid.
7 of 8 people found the following review helpful
not much beyond vocabulary lists 19 May 2008

By Karen Nelson - Published on Amazon.com

Format: Paperback
I was really excited for this book to come out -- and now I'm disappointed. The book
is beautifully put together, has good vocabulary lists and a nice selection of
readings -- but all of this was already available in Kendall's 1000 Words for Media
Arabic and Rowland's Let's Read the Arabic Newspapers (unfortunately out of print).

In other words, there are very few sections elucidating sentence structure, or how
the articles themselves are put together, or comparing articles with different biases,
or teaching you how to skim. I'm sure a good teacher could bring it all out for you,
but for self-teaching, there's simply to added value. Get Al-ahram or Al-hayat online
for free.
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