Vocabulary Cards — Session 35: Numbers 11 to 20

Print this page. Cut along the dotted lines. Each card is index-card sized. Carry them in your pocket. Count things out loud — stairs, grapes, fingers, cars.

Card 1

Say it: IH-da-'ash Means: Eleven

🎨 Picture: Eleven olives lined up on a small white plate.

Use it when: You count past ten. You're eleven years old, or your cousin is. You count the steps up to your apartment and there are eleven.

Card 2

Say it: ith-NA-'ash Means: Twelve

🎨 Picture: A clock on a kitchen wall, both hands pointing to twelve.

Use it when: It's twelve o'clock. You count a dozen eggs in the carton. You're counting the months of the year and you reach the last one.

Card 3

Say it: tha-LA-ta-'ash Means: Thirteen

🎨 Picture: Thirteen small stones stacked in a tower on a balcony ledge.

Use it when: You count the kids in your class and there are thirteen. You're playing hide and seek and counting to thirteen. Your big sister turns thirteen.

Card 4

Say it: AR-ba'-ta-'ash Means: Fourteen

🎨 Picture: Fourteen grapes on a stem, ready to share.

Use it when: You're counting cars passing on the street. You count the days until a trip. You're sorting markers and there are fourteen.

Card 5

Say it: kha-MAS-ta-'ash Means: Fifteen

🎨 Picture: Fifteen minutes on a kitchen timer — for cookies in the oven.

Use it when: You wait fifteen minutes for something. You count fifteen seashells on the Mediterranean beach. You jump rope fifteen times in a row.

Card 6

Say it: 'ish-RIN Means: Twenty

🎨 Picture: A child holding up all ten fingers — twice — laughing.

Use it when: You finish counting all the way to twenty. You count twenty cars in the parking lot. Mama says "I'll be ready in twenty minutes."

A bonus card — the in-between numbers

Card 7 (bonus)

Say it: SIT-ta-'ash, SAB-a-ta-'ash, ta-MAN-ta-'ash, TIS-a-ta-'ash Means: sixteen, seventeen, eighteen, nineteen

🎨 Picture: A staircase climbing up — each step has a number painted on it, all the way to twenty.

Use it when: You're counting and you need the numbers between fifteen and twenty. You're skipping rope and don't want to stop at fifteen. You're counting the stairs in teta's building.

Notice the pattern: most teen numbers in Levantine end with -ṭa'ash (طَعَش). Once your ear catches that ending, the teens start to feel like a little family of words.

How to use these cards

1. Count real things. Stairs going up. Grapes on a stem. Cars at a red light. Numbers stick when they're attached to something you can see and touch.
2. 30 seconds a day. Pick one card. Say it five times. Find that many of something in the room.
3. Make a ladder. Line the cards up in order — 11, 12, 13, 14, 15… 20. Walk along them like a hopscotch. Say each one as you hop.
4. Race up to twenty. See how fast you can count from إِحدَعَش to عِشرين. Then try faster. Then try whispering. Then try shouting.

A note on Levantine numbers

The numbers on these cards are the ones kids actually hear at teta's house, at the bakery, on the playground in Beirut, Amman, Damascus, or Ramallah. In school Arabic (MSA), some of these sound a little different — for example, eleven in MSA is أَحَدَ عَشَر (aHada 'ashar).

Both are correct. Levantine is what families speak. MSA is what kids read. We'll meet the written numerals (١١ ١٢ ١٣…) again soon.

For now: just count out loud. The numbers will settle into your mouth on their own time.

A little game for the car

One person says a number in English. The other person says it back in Arabic. Switch. Keep going until somebody messes up and everyone laughs.

Then start over at إِحدَعَش.

Yalla Arabic · Vocabulary Cards · Session 35