Buondì. Heartfelt sympathies to everyone whose Christmas/New Year plans have taken a further blow with the newest restrictions here in Europe, and in the UK of course, which is soon to be no longer Europe but is so far just as badly off. Our eldest daughter was due home last night but only made it […]
Pronunciation tips for English speakers from an Italian teacher
Buondì. Many thanks to our regular writer (and online Italian teacher), Francesca Colombo, who has saved me a job today by emailing me her pronunciation tips: Ciao Daniel! I had a look at the last articles you wrote about the pronunciation (haven’t read them thoroughly, though). These are a few tips for the English speakers […]
New Italian ‘easy reader’ ebook: Giallo a Capodanno (B2/C1)
Buondì. A break from Italian pronunciation today, as I have several classes to plan for and to teach, which means that time is of the essence. This week we publish a new ‘easy Italian reader’ ebook – it’s called ‘Giallo a Capodanno‘ (‘Mystery at New Year’), the level is upper-intermediate/advanced, and for the first seven […]
How to improve your Italian accent, Part 2 (where to begin?)
Buondì. Friday’s article ‘How to improve your Italian accent, Part 1 (why bother?)‘ generated some interesting emails and comments. Club members responded to the ‘why bother?’ in a range of ways – some are like me, and don’t mind having a ‘loud’ foreign accent, as long as they can make themselves understood, while others aim […]
How to improve your Italian accent, Part 1 (why bother?)
Buondì. Recently I asked for suggestions for our planned ‘How to’ series of brief articles, and one of the topics that many people mentioned they’d like help with was how to improve your accent when speaking Italian. Now I’ll confess, right out of the box, that I’ve been told many times over the years that […]
Made your holiday language-learning plans, yet?
Buondì. It must have been about this time four years ago when I decided that, as I hadn’t done any significant language-learning for more than a decade, I would have a go at teaching myself Swedish over the Christmas holidays! Digging back through our archive of articles like this one, I found ‘How I started […]
Half-price seasonal ‘eBook of the Week’: Natale a sorpresa
Buondì. Today we have a new, and very Christmassy, half-price ‘eBook of the Week’. It’s called Natale a sorpresa, the level is B2 (upper-intermediate) and this week it costs just £3.99, instead of the usual £7.99. Be aware that we published this one around this time last year. Usually our ‘eBook of the Week’ offers […]
Are Italians degenerate by nature?
Buondì. Since our language school was compelled to move to 100% online teaching by local anti-Covid restrictions, my wife has, amongst many other duties reliably and efficiently carried out, been setting up and monitoring the English conversation lessons we organise for the locals. Wow, she commented over dinner the other evening, after having listened to […]
Seeing the wood for the trees
Buondì. Many years ago, when I could barely speak Italian at all, I signed up for a part-time MBA course (taught in Italian – I was the only foreign student) at our local business school. The first module in the two-year course was on ‘la strategia’ (n.b. ‘abstract’ nouns in Italian have a ‘the’, unlike […]
New “How to” series: your suggestions, please!
Buondì. I’ve nothing to sell you this week. Deliberately as there’s far too much teaching and other stuff going on. Besides my ninety-nine million online classes, it’s also the end of the month, which comes around all too regularly! Anyone who runs or has run a small business will know that the end of the […]