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Arabic · Grade 4

Roots, Patterns and Word Families

Arabic builds families of words from three-letter roots. Learners find the root inside a word, use four common patterns to predict meaning (the doer كَاتِبٌ, the thing done مَكْتُوبٌ, the place مَكْتَبَةٌ, the tool مِفْتَاحٌ), guess new words in context, and learn to look words up in a root-based dictionary.

  • 4 lessons
  • About 100 minutes
  • Roots and patterns check: 10 questions
  • Ways to answer: fill in the blanks, choose an answer, highlight a text, match pairs, put in order and sort into groups
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What learners will discover

  • Find the three-letter root of a familiar word by removing added letters (ال، م، ة، long vowels, prefixes and suffixes).
  • Use the patterns فَاعِلٌ (doer), مَفْعُولٌ (thing done), مَفْعَلٌ / مَفْعَلَةٌ (place) and مِفْعَالٌ (tool) to predict what a word means.
  • Build a word family from a root and work out unknown words in a text from their root, pattern and context.
  • Look a word up in a root-based dictionary: identify its root and find the root in alphabetical order.

Lessons

  1. Find the root 5 steps3 practiceabout 25 min
  2. Patterns that predict meaning 5 steps3 practiceabout 25 min
  3. Word families in a text 5 steps4 practiceabout 25 min
  4. Look it up by root 5 steps4 practiceabout 25 min
  5. Roots and patterns check 10 questions at the end

Keep exploring

Games to practice with

  • Spanish Adventure¡Hola! Learn first Spanish words through pictures, little stories and short conversations.
  • French AdventureBonjour ! Learn first French words through pictures, little stories and short conversations.
  • Arabic AdventureMarhaban! Learn first words in Modern Standard Arabic, from letter shapes to little stories.

More 4th grade world language

Guide for grown-ups