Ace My Language - Arabic Edition [Paperback]

Jabra F. Ghneim (Author), Jabra Ghneim (Editor, Illustrator)

Book Description

Publication Date: August 1, 2006

With over 400 reading and more than 8 recorded hours of listening exercises, Ace My Language Arabic is ideal for those with a foundation in Arabic who want to dramatically improve their acquisition and retention, as well as their performance on standardized tests, including the DLPT. The exercises, from current authentic sources, are statistically engineered to achieve amazing results by maximizing exposure to the language most frequently encountered in real-world contexts. This book was formerly called Ace the DLPT.

Editorial Reviews

Review

I'm impressed with it (the book) and I do recommend it - based soley on having perused the reading portion (I haven't checked out the listening portion yet but the reading portion alone is great for what the book is intended to do). It is not a "learn Arabic" book. It's an improvement tool for folks who already have some Arabic. It is very well focused specifically on improving DLPT performance. I think the folks who could most benefit from this are those at the 1+ to 2 level who are serious about spending some time and effort getting to 3. This book will help them focus their effort and get the most DLPT improvement out of the time they invest. Casting a wide net in newspapers and internet and reading widely is another approach. But in this book Mr. Ghneim has already cast that wide net for you and collected the material in an easy to use format - plus taken the extra step of constructing DLPT-like questions about the material. He is clearly familiar not only with the kinds of materials that go into a DLPT, but also with the kinds of questions that are constructed around those materials. --Devin H. USAF

The comprehensive Arabic language tutorial package developed by Jabra F. Ghneim has proven to be an invaluable tool for students of Modern Standard Arabic (MSA). His work, which involves a vast amount of critical listening and reading question and answer exercises, has proven to be vital to the student that is required to grasp a wide range of global language knowledge. Mr. Ghneim has developed a masterful project that keenly recognizes the necessities for basic and expert understanding of MSA. The material is interwoven from subject to subject which enables the student to quickly transcend all subject matter barriers of learning a foreign language. --Jason E., Arabic Linguist, US Navy

Jabra Ghneim is an excellent language instructor. His excellent command of both Arabic and English coupled with highly effective teaching methods ensures improved results. Under his instruction I was able to raise my scores to their highest levels in 15 years. I would highly recommend his materials and intend to make them a part of my test preparation routine. --Loren B., Arabic Linguist, US Navy

About the Author

Jabra Ghneim is the CEO and President of Global Language Systems. He has over 14 years of experience in Middle Eastern localization, translation, training and consulting for multinational corporations, military organizations, and government entities in the US, Europe, and Middle East.

Product Details

• Paperback: 255 pages
• Publisher: Global Language Systems; 1st edition (August 1, 2006)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0976840413
• ISBN-13: 978-0976840411
• Product Dimensions: 10.9 x 8.3 x 0.9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 2 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (8 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #148,637 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

24 of 24 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Useful upper-intermediate Arabic resource for self-study or classroom study., June 8, 2008

By 

Mrs.Beeton (Kingston, Australia) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Ace My Language - Arabic Edition (Paperback)

Please note, this is not a textbook. You don't get grammar or vocab. It's an exercise book to practice listening and reading skills for media Arabic, aimed at improving test scores on the DLPT and similar examinations.

This book is a collection of just over 400 Arabic news items each of around 100 words. The author notes, "Using proprietary statistical methods, I have ensured that you will encounter extensive essential vocabulary, every type of sentences structure, and varying degrees of textual complexity that you will see and hear in real-world contexts and on many standardized tests."

The first section contains the texts in a very clear Arabic font, followed by a single multiple choice question. The second section simply contains the questions and the third contains the answers to the questions. Included is a CD with all of the texts read by Ghneim, the files being provided in WAV and MP3 format.

The value in this book is the excellent choice of texts, the clear, very readable Arabic font and Ghneim's excellent, clear and well-paced readings of the texts. There is no glossary provided, and I think that is appropriate, since in my experience with these texts I can get the subject and broad picture and then go to Hans Wehr for clarification of unknown vocab.

One issue I noted was that, in transferring the audio files to iTunes and then to my iPod, every file had the EXACT same name. When transferred to my desktop, and having changed some of the names, the original (unhelpful) title reverted as soon as I dragged it into iTunes. As you can imagine, this resulted in the VERY TEDIOUS process of moving all 406 MP3s across to iTunes, then clicking on and relabeling them in a numerical sequence.

Well, that was a pain. But having transferred and renamed each track I now have a massive resource for listening study.

The questions, for me, are less useful. But that is because I have reached a level of self-study. But I am sure they would form a useful basis for classroom discussion of the texts.

I absolutely recommend this for upper-intermediate self-study and advanced revision and think it would be terrifically useful for teachers of Arabic.

I've given it five stars, which may seem high (my previous review also scored five) but I think that reflects the quality and effort that has gone into what is a very useful study tool in an area of language study that has over the years been a bit shambolic and random. Clearly I am not assessing it on grammar instruction or glossary - since neither of these areas are covered - but on the basis of what the book is designed to do and how ell it achieves its objective.

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars perfect for improving your listening skills!!, June 21, 2009

By 

3rabi "3rabi" (dc) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Ace My Language - Arabic Edition (Paperback)

This is a great book to help with your listening. Each listening exercise is only a short paragraph so you don't get overwhelmed. The material gets more difficult as you move through the book.

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Taking the DLPT? Buy this book!, December 22, 2009

By 

Tristan (Southern California) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Ace My Language - Arabic Edition (Paperback)

I purchased this book back in 2007 before it was available on Amazon.com (I'm almost annoyed that it's so easily accessible as it took me forever to find such a great resource just using google). I bought it knowing I was going to take the DLPT a few months down the road. This book (or more like Reader, as it is spiral plastic-bound) has every touch and feel of what the DLPT is actually like. There are three parts to this book: 1) written out Arabic excerpts from about 50 words up to maybe 200 dealing with absolutely any issue 2) A single question like What is this article talking about? A, B, C, or D multiple choice questions, and 3) A CD with all the excerpts read aloud -in very well-spoken MSA- that can be put onto your iPod..I believe there are 406 total questions/excerpts/audio tracks.
ALSO, duh, in the back there are all the answers.
What this book DOESN'T have, unfortunately, is a listing of any vocab. As stated earlier, there are excerpts dealing with just about everything, from pigs getting massages in China before they're butchered for meat, some terrorists somewhere blew up a house, the Prime Minister of France is attending an arts festival, and Scientists somewhere discovered a cure for some disease...it's absolutely crazy how much vocab is in this book that I don't know, and I've been off and on studying since 2002!
However, this book helped me learn early on that I don't need to know every single word, I just have to recognize maybe even just one simple word that will give away the answer. So as you progress, you get more self-confidence, which alone will make you feel better about yourself going into the test.
In the end, I passed the DLPT. They wouldn't tell me my score (3, 4, or 5), but I can easily say that without this book I would have been screwed!
For vocab, you may want to check out: [...] and scroll to the bottom where it has links to common words/ verbs from the Arabic DLPT.