Language Crawler: June 2015

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Anyone who has ever studied Arabic can tell you that the most difficult part is the verb system. There are sound verbs (the Arabic version of "regular" verbs) that are easy enough and textbooks generally provide sufficient details and full conjugation lists for them. However, there are also hollow verbs, weak verbs, "defective" verbs, geminate (or double) verbs, assimilated verbs, hamzated verbs and passive verbs. If all that is not enough to scare you away, each of these different types of verbs can come in one or more of nine different forms or "measures" and you have to learn them all if you ever want to get anywhere with Arabic.

Here are a few links to help you better understand Arabic verb forms or measures

Introduction to the 10 Arabic Verb Forms
10 Sentence Model Story Illustrating the 10 Measures
The Arabic Verb Forms
Arabic Verb Forms Interactive Sound Chart
Arabic Grammar - Verb Forms
The Meaning of the Ten Measures
Wikipedia Arabic Verb Forms
Meaning of Arabic Verb Forms
Form II Verbs
Form III Verbs
Form IV Verbs
Form V and VI Verbs
Form VII and VIII Verbs
Form IX and X Verbs

Arabic Verbs and Essentials of Grammar

Practice Makes Perfect: Arabic Verb Tenses

See also:
Easy Way to Learn Colloquial Arabic Verbs
Everything You Always Wanted to Know About Arabic Dialects or Varieties (But Were Too Overwhelmed to Ask)

1) Este, ese, esta, esas… This, these, those… Get them confused?
Just remember the simple phrase "this and these have t's". The Spanish words for this/these (este, esta, estes, estas) contain the letter "t" while the Spanish words for that/those (ese, esa, eses, esas) have no t's.

2) You can learn some of the irregular command verbs with the sentence "Vin Diesel has ten weapons, eh?" This can help you remember Ven / Di / Sal / Haz / Ten / Ve / Pon / Sé.

3) Sixty and seventy sound alike?
Try associating 60 (sesenta) with 6 (seis) and 70 (setenta) with 7 (siete).
Just remove the letter "i" in each case (seis = ses = sesenta / siete = sete = setenta)

4) You can use the acronym WEIRDO to remember which situations require the subjunctive tense in Spanish. W.E.I.R.D.O. stands for Wants or Wishes, Emotions, Impersonal Expressions, Recommendations, Doubt/Denial, and is used after the word Ojalá. Another suggestion is WEDDING where the letters stand for Will, Emotion, Desire, Doubt, Impersonal expressions, Negative and Generalized Characteristics.

5) For Spanish gender, you can try the mnemonic used by a lot of Spanish teachers: "Guys are LONERS and girls like DIJON mustard" to remember that words ending in l, o, n, e, r and s tend to be masculine and words ending in d, i, a and -sión are feminine. Of course, there are always exceptions (such as el día and la mano), but it's a start.