Arabic Alphabet Course (Lesson 3)

The Letters Baa, Taa & THaa

 

·        The next letters of the Arabic alphabet are Baa, Taa and THaa

 

 

·        We are grouping these letters together because the basic shape of the letters looks the same; only the dots are different

 

·        Baa (ب) corresponds to the English B
Taa (ت) corresponds somewhat to the English T
Thaa (ث) corresponds somewhat to the combination TH

 

Listening & Pronouncing

 

·        Baa is easy to pronounce and detect because it’s identical to the English B
Taa is like the letter T, except is sounds softer
THaa sounds like the TH part in the word bath

 

·        Use the following rule to help you link the Arabic letter shape with the sound:
The word “two” is spelled with a T and Taa has two dots
The word “three” is spelled with a TH and THaa has three dots

 

 

·        Exercise: repeat the words you hear in each of the following exercises
Try to find all instances of Baa, Taa and THaa

 

 

Reading

 

·        There are only 2 letters with 1 dot underneath the body: Baa (ب) and Jeem (ج)
But the shape of Jeem is completely different from Baa
Jeem has an angle

 

end	middle	beginning	by itself
ـب	ـبـ	بـ	ب	Baa (ب)
ـج	ـجـ	جـ	ج	Jeem (ج)

 

·        There are only 2 letters with 2 dots anywhere: Taa (ت) and Qaaf (ق)
They’re on top in both letters
But the bodies of Taa and Qaaf are completely different
Qaaf has a loop

 

end	middle	beginning	by itself
ـت	ـتـ	تـ	ت	Taa (ت)
ـق	ـقـ	قـ	ق	Qaaf (ق)

 

·        There are only 2 letters with 3 dots anywhere: THaa (ث) and SHeen (ش)
They’re on top in both letters
But the bodies of THaa and SHeen are completely different
SHeen has little groves and a hook at the end

 

end	middle	beginning	by itself
ـث	ـثـ	ثـ	ث	THaa (ث)
ـش	ـشـ	شـ	ش	SHeen (ش)

 

·        Exercise: scan the following lines for instances of Baa, Taa and THaa; how many do you see of each?

 

تبت يدا أبي لهب

بما كنتم فيه تختلفون

الصدقات والذين لا يجدون

يطلب حثيثا والشمس والقمر

 

·        Answers [3 Baa, 2 Taa, 0 Thaa], [1 Baa, 3 Taa, 0 Thaa],
[0 Baa, 1 Taa, 0 Thaa], [1 Baa, 0 Taa, 2 Thaa]

 

Writing

 

·        Baa, Taa and THaa are all written with the same body
The body is a long, horizontal curve

 

·        The 4 forms of these letters are the same; the only difference is the number and position of dots

 

end	middle	beginning	by itself
ـب	ـبـ	بـ	ب
ـت	ـتـ	تـ	ت
ـث	ـثـ	ثـ	ث

 

·        Exercise: copy the Baa-Taa-THaa body 20 times in all 4 forms

 

·        Exercise: copy the following word 20 times

 

ثابت

 

Proceed to lesson 4