Updated 1May2021
Based on Buckwalter's Frequency Dictionary of Arabic, aka "FDA", published by Routledge in 2010
Even though it contains more than 6000 lemmas, this is a lightweight deck, relying on Javascript TTS (i.e., on-the-fly TTS) instead of audio files. Works great with AnkiWeb on Mac and iOS AnkiMobile ; still work-in-progress for Anki desktop and AnkiDroid.
How to use it: after download and import, just suspend out all the cards except the one you want to study. For instance, you can start with the most frequent 1000 words (based on their NoteID from FDA0001 to FDA0999), and also unsuspend the new words you encounter in your courses or readings.
The main production cards cue with the English translation of the word, or with the French translation, or with an example sentence (with ____ in place of the word).
You cycle between those 3 cues by clicking on the gray area.(so you can use the deck even if you don't understand French nor like the examples). You can also add in the Mnemonic field whatever helps you.
The list includes about 5300 common words from the FDA, plus about 300 Proper names, the rest are other more or less common words that are not in the FDA.
Example sentences are taken from the FDA, or from the series "Assimil Arabic with ease", or from the "Arabic Sentences" anki decks (
https://ankiweb.net/shared/info/384561995) or from a few other sources (eg headlines from the Arab press on Twitter).
Since most of the audio relies on on-the-fly native TTS,
this deck is really light (about 2MB download. Much nicer on Damien's servers too).
This is a TRILINGUAL deck, you can use it as French to Arabic, or English to Arabic, or both. If you're a French speaker learning English or an English speaker learning French, you will learn double at the same time.
Please try it and give feedback, come back regularly to get updates.
- Words ordered from most to least frequent as per their NoteID.
- the NoteID gives the ranking of each word. The words from the FDA have an ID as "FDAnnnn" where nnnn is their FDA rank (FDANnnn for proper nouns). Those that are not from the FDA have an ID starting with "XA".
- all names and most adjectives include singular + plural, sometimes feminine, because that's how you should learn names and adjectives
- all verbs should include perfect and imperfect, and masdar, because that's how you should learn verbs.
- the main production cards (ProdAR) ask with either the English or the French meaning, or with an example sentence (with the word replaced by _____ ). You can cycle by between the 3 by clicking on the gray zone.
- Notes with examples generate a second recognition card (RecoAR).
- Lemmas identified has having several meanings generate a third card (AR2EN), to make sure you remember all those meanings.
- the Arabic answer is spoken out with the native TTS (works fine with iOS and OSX both with the native app and with ankiweb). Ideas & help welcome to have it work on AnkiDroid too and on the native app on Windows.
- I have example sentences for about 3000 words, will complete over time.
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This is based Tim Buckwalter's famous 5000 list - the same list that half a dozen shared Anki decks use already. Except this one is undoubtedly the most complete. Tim Buckwalter has given his authorization to use it for educational purpose. However, if you use this deck you should buy the book, it's worth it and his work should be recognized. French translation, complements (imperfect, plural, masdars), the choice of example sentences, mnemonics, and any mistake in the deck is mine.
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Regarding the TTS:
This is somewhat experimental, with lots of Javascript and relying on native TTS of iOS/OSX/your computer (with the AwesomeTTS add-on).
It does not use the new Anki native feature {{tts ar-SA:field}}.
Works great with iPhone (please buy Anki's app, it's great and really worth it) and with a browser, provided that you have an Arabic TTS installed. Browser tested on Mac and on Android. For Android, I purchased Acapella's TTS service since Arabic was not in the native TTS service of Samsung or Google. This may depend on your Android device.
Also note that having the TTS work with AnkiDroid is still work in progress.