أعمل خلال اليوم.

أعمل is the first-person singular imperfect form of the verb عَمِلَ (to work / to do).

So أعمل means I work, I am working, or sometimes I do, depending on context.

Its full vowelled form here is أَعْمَلُ.

In Arabic, the verb itself often already tells you the subject.

In أعمل, the prefix أـ shows that the subject is I. So Arabic does not need أنا here.

You could say أنا أعمل خلال اليوم, but that would usually add emphasis, such as I work during the day.

The Arabic imperfect can cover several meanings that English splits up:

• I work
• I am working
• I do work

In this sentence, أعمل خلال اليوم most naturally sounds habitual or general, like something that happens during the day as a regular pattern.

If context made it clear, it could also describe a present action.

خلال means during, throughout, or in the course of.

In this sentence, it connects the action of working to a time period: during the day.

Compared with في (in / at), خلال is more specific about something happening within the span of a period of time.

Not really in this sentence.

Although اليوم can mean today in many contexts, in خلال اليوم it means the day or the daytime / the course of the day.

So here the phrase is about a time span, not specifically the calendar meaning today.

خلال اليوم means during the day / throughout the day, focusing on the time period as a span.

في اليوم usually means in the day and is less natural here for this meaning. In many contexts, في اليوم is used in expressions like مرة في اليوم (once a day).

So for during the day, خلال اليوم is the better choice.

The fully vowelled sentence is:

أَعْمَلُ خِلَالَ الْيَوْمِ

Here is what is happening:

• أَعْمَلُ ends in ـُ because it is an indicative imperfect verb.
• خِلَالَ has ـَ because it is functioning as a time expression.
• الْيَوْمِ has ـِ because it comes after خلال in an iḍāfa-like structure, so it is in the genitive.

In normal everyday writing, these short vowels are usually omitted.

For a learner, it is perfectly fine to think of خلال as a word that works like the preposition during.

More technically, Arabic grammar often analyzes it as a noun used adverbially in a construction with the following noun. That is why the next word, اليوم, is in the genitive.

But at an early stage, the most useful thing to remember is:

خلال + time expression = during / throughout

Yes, absolutely.

Both are grammatical:

• أعمل خلال اليوم
• أنا أعمل خلال اليوم

The version without أنا is very normal because the verb already shows the subject.

Adding أنا may sound more emphatic, contrastive, or explicit, depending on context.

أعمل is pronounced approximately aʿmalu.

A rough breakdown:

• أَ = a
• ع = a deep throat sound that English does not have
• مَ = ma
• لُ = lu

The hardest part for many English speakers is ع. It is not like a normal English consonant. It is produced from the throat, and with practice it becomes easier.

So the whole word is roughly:

aʿ-ma-lu

The meaning changes:

• أعمل خلال اليوم = I work during the day / throughout the day
• أعمل اليوم = I work today / I am working today

So خلال اليوم gives a time span within the day, while اليوم by itself often points to today as a specific day.

The sentence begins with the verb, which is very common in Arabic:

أعمل خلال اليوم

This is a normal and natural order. Arabic often uses verb-first word order.

You can also put the subject in if needed:

أنا أعمل خلال اليوم

That does not change the basic meaning, but it makes the subject more explicit.