monbaba

The idea of a Moroccan class in Toronto for children, and potentially for teenagers and young adults, came about to fill a long experienced void in the Moroccan community for an essential social service.

Many communities from North Africa and the Middle East, whether in Toronto or Montreal, have started weekend Arabic classes years ago for their younger generations and are now collecting positive results. Children have a better understanding of their cultural background and can identify more easily to their country of origin or to where their parents came from.

Being able to understand and speak the Moroccan dialect or darija, to read Arabic and for the children to have a basic understanding of their religious and cultural background could facilitate a better integration not only in the Moroccan community but also in the Canadian society.

With those results in mind, a group of teachers, volunteers and a coordinator prepared a short curriculum for the weekend class based on the following pedagogy:

To teach the children the Arabic Alphabet to help them read and understand the Quran and Arabic written communication.

To bring the children closer to the Moroccan culture by communicating exclusively with them in Moroccan dialect, by teaching them day to day Moroccan expressions and words, basic knowledge of Moroccan history and geography...etc.

To provide islamic education by helping the children learn a few surats of the Quran and basic Islamic teachings.

As much as we like to see all of our young children join the class, we also like to invite teenagers and adults, Moroccans or not, to join a special class for older or more mature students. Also, encouraged to join the class, children and adults from other faiths who may only be interested in learning the Moroccan dialect and culture. Special arrangements will be made for this category of students.