Inside Qasid

Day 2 of classes and already I'm verging on exhausted. After the placement exam last week I was placed in to the 1A class. That means I'm in level 1, but not the lowest in level 1. In level one there is 1B and 1A. Level 1B is actually the lowest class which starts at teaching the alphabet and for individuals that have no experience with Arabic at all or very little.

1A is the next step up from 1B and the last class in level 1 before level 2. My class is for people that know the alphabet and can read, write and speak Arabic on a very basic level. I can read small stories, speak basic conversational Arabic and write the most common words I know. Writing is important and taught in classes but out of all four: listening, reading, speaking and writing...writing is focused on the least technically.

My roommates have been studying for a few years each at least to they are in level 3 and level 4. Its pretty great cause then I get help with my homework and stuff! Kendra, one of my roommates was helping me sound out words to then spell them for my homework today, which is to write sentences describing one of my classmates. So I had to sound out words like "Washington DC, George Mason, Virginia, etc... that needless to say are not in the dictionary in the back of my book. It was good cause it helped me understand how to spell words in Arabic from nothing. Pretty sweet!

The collage above is of my classroom, outside of Qasid, a professor teaching, and the computer/study lap at Qasid.

Rest of the photos on Flickr:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/90572684@N08/sets/