How to Read & Write Arabic 11: Raa

This week we'll be looking at the letter 'raa', an easy letter to pronouce and also to find in writtten text. Raa is another non-connector and so only occurs in two forms, connected and independent and looks like this:


Independent




Connected



The Sound of Rrrrrr
The letter 'raa' is very similar to the sound of the English 'r', but is always rolled. Roll your r's and you'll have the correct Arabic sound. No roll, no Arabic raa!

Practice making a whirring sound by flapping your tongue against the roof of your mouth and make the rrrrrrrrrr sound. If you say it loud and high, and cup your mouth, you'll have the sound of fun at girls parties in the Middle East!


All forms
In this photo for the sign to the hamlet of Ras Abu Jarjur (which is a tiny little village in the middle of Bahrain) you'll find a connected and an independent raa. And you'll find you can read most of the other Arabic letters in the photo ~YEE HA~



Medial/Final
In the signs below you'll find at least one example of raa in it's connected form. Look carefully at the fonts - even though the font is written in slightly different ways in each of the photos, the basic form will always stay the same, just like the difference between Times New Roman, Lucida Sans, Courier New or Ariel in English typography.










Independent
The photos below show what the independent form of the letter raa look like:








Hide and Seek
Look at the photo below and try to find all the raas. Once you've found them, decide in which form they appear. Decide which other letters you also know and in which form they appear:






Practice/ Homework
Should you wish to practice writing the letter 'raa':

1.
Complete the hide and seek activities in the article above

2.
Using lined paper write the letter 'raa' in its two different forms, as many times as you can; final and independent. Because 'raa' is a non connector you'll have to write one of the other letters you already know before the 'raa' in order to connect it. A minimum of 20 repetitions is suggested, always remembering to write the lines first, then the dots.

3.
Re-read the previous wgaw blog posts or wgaw subject/ labels 'How to Read and Write Arabic} and try to find as many raas as you can in the postings. Then decide if raa is in its independent or final format.


Overview
1. The nineth letter of the Arabic alphabet is called, 'raa'
2. The are two forms of the letter 'raa'; independent and final
3. Raa is one of the six non-connectors and never-ever-ever connects with the letter which follows it, even if it occurs in the middle of a word.


What's Next?
Next week we’ll look at the next letter of the Arabic alphabet, 'zaay', another non-connector.