Thread: Arson Threat Forces Kindergarten To Axe Arabic Lessons.

Originally Posted by vnx205

See! Not only is studying an extra language beneficial, but there are even benefits in simply reading articles about why it is good to study other languages.

Do I get to share the prize with you since I provided the links for you to read?

No it is all mine.

Lets's try and keep the thread on topic shall we....

Vlad is right that Chinese would probably be more useful. Our school has Chinese. However Chinese is actually quite difficult with more than 4000 characters - it takes daily usage for at least a decade. The best way will probably be children of Chinese living here growing up speaking both Chinese and English.
I guess the point of the OP is how disgusting that someone would be so racist they would threaten to burn down a kindy just because kids were learning Arabic. How dumb!

No arabic should be taught at kindy.I'm sorry but next thing they will be chanting"ALLAH AKBAH"or some other gibberish.Funny how only white aussies can be rascist.Islam wants to take over the world because thay are the chosen ones and we are just cattle in their eyes.But don't call any moslem a rascist,you might upset them

But why the parcticular slant against Arabic, when it has been an integral part of the English language for centuries, and Australian culture?


You would be branded Un-Australian if you didn't embrace Coffee, Alcohol and the Barbecue, all of which are words lifted straight from the Arabic language. You would have trouble "Stopping the boats" with out an Admiral in charge, which is also an Arabic word. Schoolkids would run riot without a Mufti day every now and again, and your knowledge of ANZAC history would be incomplete without knowing about Baksheesh, Shufti and Bint. How plain would our tastebuds be without Lemons, Limes, and Apricots which originated in the Middle east and were named by the Arabs. And Aussie moviegoers can thank the Arabs in the city of Jaffa for Orange-flavoured Candy (which is also an Arabic word). While we're talking fruits, Sultana was the title given to the first wife of the Sultan, who generally wound up having brown, shrivelled skin compared to the much younger fifth, sixth, or seventh wives. And the written form of numbers and the decimal system of counting we use are also Arabic. Could you imagine the telephone system without Arabic numerals? "Caesar, can you give me a call please on MDCCC CDLVI DCCLXXXIX. Brutus."


And so we can use these words without anxiety, they predate the emergence of Islam, from a time when many Arabic speakers were followers of Christ, Judaism or Hindu.

Language as in speaking it, doesn't give you any understanding of the culture of the people who speak that language. Interactions with the culture does more to understanding the difference between each culture. Language is helpful but interactions are more important. And as I see it we are to lenient at the moment on this. As stated there were lots of language's offered in this government sponsored initiative. What was the motivation for this language at this school?

Originally Posted by 303gunner

But why the parcticular slant against Arabic, when it has been an integral part of the English language for centuries, and Australian culture?


You would be branded Un-Australian if you didn't embrace Coffee, Alcohol and the Barbecue, all of which are words lifted straight from the Arabic language. You would have trouble "Stopping the boats" with out an Admiral in charge, which is also an Arabic word. Schoolkids would run riot without a Mufti day every now and again, and your knowledge of ANZAC history would be incomplete without knowing about Baksheesh, Shufti and Bint. How plain would our tastebuds be without Lemons, Limes, and Apricots which originated in the Middle east and were named by the Arabs. And Aussie moviegoers can thank the Arabs in the city of Jaffa for Orange-flavoured Candy (which is also an Arabic word). While we're talking fruits, Sultana was the title given to the first wife of the Sultan, who generally wound up having brown, shrivelled skin compared to the much younger fifth, sixth, or seventh wives. And the written form of numbers and the decimal system of counting we use are also Arabic. Could you imagine the telephone system without Arabic numerals? "Caesar, can you give me a call please on MDCCC CDLVI DCCLXXXIX. Brutus."


And so we can use these words without anxiety, they predate the emergence of Islam, from a time when many Arabic speakers were followers of Christ, Judaism or Hindu.

Well said, Arabic and Islam are very different things. Arabic culture is very rich and ancient. They were learned when Europe was a cesspit of ignorance. Also true of the Chinese.

There are three points that deserve examination here.

The first is a threat to burn down a preschool - for whatever reason. I hope there is nobody here who supports this? If there is, i would like to see their reasoning, as it would seem to put them in the same box as ISIS and Boko Haram.

The second point is the teaching of a second language at this level of education. It is increasingly being realised that learning a second language is a major advantage in understanding your own language and improving your ability to use it. Not only this, but young children learn language more easily than adults and even older adolescents - it seems that the language learning ability is genetic, but that this genetic ability switches off about the start of the teens, making language learning more difficult. So if a second language is to be learned at all, starting early is a real advantage.

The third point is whether Arabic is a suitable choice. Since the primary reason for teaching a second language at this age is improve the child's ability to use their own language and to enhance their language learning ability in the future, it is probably important to teach a language that has made a substantial contribution to English, and/or that is a major world language. There are a number of languages that fit this picture - obviously German, French, Latin, Spanish (in fact all the Romance languages), but you would have to include Arabic, as it has contributed in a major way to English vocabulary, and, along with English, Spanish, French and perhaps Russian is one of the most widely used world languages. A couple of the most commonly advocated languages for teaching in this country, Mandarin and Indonesian, do not meet these criteria - neither have contributed as much to English as has Arabic, and neither is in as widespread use as the world languages - although it should be pointed out that in terms of number of native speakers, the top ones (in order) are Mandarin, Spanish, English, Hindi, Arabic, Portugese, Bengali, Russian, Japanese, Punjabi, German - and then Indonesian!

John