A very low portion of the Arabic community can speak the true language. For example, the Lebanese community speak Arabic in a slang way-i.e. not actual Arabic. As time goes past, the interest of families towards the languages other than English spoken in homes diminishes. Nevertheless, LOTE is not something learnt in Year 12, learning Turkish and mastering it was a priority for myself- Learning your mother tongue is a must
(being 1337 at it
).
I used to take Arabic classes in Year 8 & 9, so I know a few general sentences
, but it is a pretty hard language.
In the future, the high achievers for all LOTEs will comprise of those students who live and breath the language at home, with there friends and pretty much everywhere they go.
Yes that's true, but the way people speak arabic, is different to the way they write.... and in Lebanon, there are several dialects as with most countries, despite it's size, they have a rather large amount of varying dialects, not all speak in slang. Sure being lebanese myself made it a little easier for me to do well in arabic; despite the fact that I didn't get tutored in arabic, and only completed 3 hours a week of classes for the subject, and achieved a study score of 45, but it's just sad to see less and less people undertaking the language, seeing that so many countries speak arabic, and being able to speak it alone is a great achievement.
Yes I agree. A similar case exists with Turkish. The following countries speak Turkish with different dialects:
Albania, Azerbaijan, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Bulgaria, Croatia, Cyprus, Greece, Hungary, Iraq, Jordan, Kosovo, Lebanon, Republic of Macedonia, Moldova, Montenegro, Northern Cyprus, Palestine, Romania, Russia, Serbia, Syria, Turkey, Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan.
The majority of these countries can speak it since the Ottoman Empire ruled these countries for hundreds of years.
The sad thing with LOTEs (well at least I know with Turkish & Arabic) is that students do not appreciate this opportunity. Having the opportunity to do a subject you are familiar with from the womb to the tomb is really great

. The amount of interest to languages by this generation is decreasing and there is only a little amount of people who are capable of achieving high scores. Firstly, I reckon parents are at fault for not injecting the love of the language to there kids from a very young age- if this step is done correctly, I'm sure success will come

.
Ok that's it from me for now

.
EDIT: I can read Arabic though

(learnt how to in Grade 2 =))