No time to read this? Why not find something to study instead? A1 – Beginner/Elementary | A2 – Pre-Intermediate | B1 – Intermediate | B2 – Upper-Intermediate | C1 – Advanced | C2 – Proficiency | What’s my level? | Italian level test
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Buondì.
E mercoledì di nuovo, and I’ve barely started catching up, after Bug was kept home from the petting zoo for six days, so in my tender, full-time care.
That included three trips to the veterinarian on the other side of town, just Bug and me, in our ropey old Fiat Punto.
It was a change of scene, at least. In the waiting room I met a nice Somali lady one visit, and an equally nice Italian woman another, both of whom had animals of a similar age and species suffering from the same lurgy.
On our first visit (Tuesday), the vet was upbeat, nothing to worry about, buy some of this expensive crap whose only function is to stop you begging me to prescribe antibiotics, and come back next week, just to check everything’s fine.
By Thursday Bug had lost his bark, and was emitting worrying rattles when he growled. Stefi recorded the sound and sent it to the vet, who told us come in the next day, but warned us that if the rattle was to worsen overnight we’d need the Emergency Room.
Friday’s appointment was all long faces and maximum strength, last-ditch, do-or-die pharmeceutical products, which we were to purchase from our ‘hay and bones’ allowance and adminster at inconvenient times, day and night. At which point, we all got ill too.
So the weekend was fun. At one point, to break up 24 hours of relentless pet care, we drove the pup to a mall. When we parked in the underground garage, we noticed he was snoring happily in the back, with no detectable rattling, so decided we’d nap, too, right there in the dark garage.
We dozed in our seats until it was time to drive back home for the next feed/meds session, so never made it to the shops and coffee bars above.
Monday, Bug was back on four paws, and in good voice, the only one of us not sniffling, sneezing and suffering. The substitute vet passed him to return to the zoo on Tuesday. Grazie al dio!
So, in the meantime what’s been happening? The FREE TRIAL LESSON OFFER at NativeSpeakerTeachers.com, mostly.
Obviously I haven’t been able to do as much nagging, I mean promotional emailing, as I usually manage, so they’ve so far given away only a small fraction of the 150 free lessons they have a budget for.
Fancy 30 minutes with an Italian/Spanish/French/German native speaker teacher, one-to-one, online?
Gratis?
And I’ll be back Friday with a reminder, pet-care permitting.
What else?
Perhaps you have, as I do, an endless ‘To Do list’, which serves its function well when it comes to keeping all the things that are ‘to do’ handily noted in one place, but badly, in the sense that the ‘to do’ things tend never to actually get done.
One of the perhaps million separate items on mine, about which I’ve felt guilty for not getting to in any spare moment over the last decade, is/was ‘Fix the OnlineItalianClub.com level test!’
All level tests are imperfect one way or another. This one is based on the test that Stefi and I wrote for our Italian school when we launched it, back in 2006. There are forty questions, and by answering them you might have an idea of just how much or little Italian you know, or can guess at. These things need to be interpreted, of course.
The school’s version of the test is on paper, or actually email these days, and works fairly well to sort complete beginners from elementary students, elementary students from pre-intermediate students, pre-intermediate students from intermediate students, and so on.
The higher a student’s level, the less well the test works, which is fine, as when we’re ‘off the top’ of the test, somewhere around B1/B2 level, the teachers can easily figure out just how good someone is during a brief chat.
The club’s online version obviously doesn’t have the supplementary brief chat, nor any listening component (very important!), but is otherwise basically the same. The problem is/was the instructions.
I used to get emails (I hope no more) from people regularly, who would write something like “I answered all the questions, but didn’t get a score. So I did the whole test again – four times – but still nothing. Help!”
Take a look at the test and it’s clearly old-school, in terms of design, and therefore also the technology that powers it. There are all these ugly boxes to type your answers in, for one thing. What a pain! EXCEPT…
The boxes AREN’T for typing your answers in… The A/B/C/D boxes show the four options (after you press the ‘Next Question’ button), and the box below shows whether you choose the correct answer. NO TYPING REQUIRED.
The old instructions were “There are 40 questions. Choose the best response for each one” to which I have now added (after having emailed this tip hundreds of times…) “by CLICKING THE GREY A/B/C/D buttons (don’t type your answers into the white box!)”
So what should happen is: click ‘Next Question’ > read the question and the four answers > click the grey A/B/C/D button to show which you prefer > read the message in the box below to see if you are correct > click ‘Next Question’.
Took me about five minutes to sort that out, when I eventually got around to it.
The problem, of course, is the other 9,999,999 things on the ‘to do’ list. Five minutes each is more than I have left. Where to start?
Sometimes staying home with a sick pet is the easiest option, after all.
(Don’t forget the FREE TRIAL LESSON OFFER, will you??)
A presto.
Two More Italian Movie ‘Ebooks of the Week’ – Half Price!
Yesterday EasyReaders.org began a new half-price ‘Ebook of the Week’ offer. Below is a copy/paste of the mailing they sent out. It’s classic movies again. Some club members like that sort of thing, and these are good ones. I expect you could find them on the internet…
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Yet again, our half-price ‘Ebook of the Week’ offer comprises two titles from our Classic Italian movie series of Italian ‘easy readers.
The two short texts with online audio have been written by an award-winning scriptwriter (who teaches Italian between movie projects to pay the rent) with the idea of making well-known films from Italian movie history accessible for all learners of the Italian language, not just advanced students with developed listening-comprehension skills.
This week’s half-price choices are Nuovo Cinema Paradiso (level A2/B1, pre-intermediate/intermediate) and I soliti ignoti (level B1, intermediate). Until we close down the offer, early next week, each costs just £4.99. So you could get BOTH but just pay £9.99, the usual price for one!
One of Italian cinema’s masterpieces, the Oscar-winning ‘Nuovo Cinema Paradiso’, directed by Giuseppe Tornatore, is retold here for learners of Italian.
Growing up without a father in post-WW2 Sicily isn’t easy, but Totò makes friends with Alfredo, projectionist at the town’s only cinema, and develops a passion for movies…
- .pdf e-book (+ audio available free online)
- .mobi (Kindle-compatible) and .epub (other ebook readers) available on request at no extra charge – just add a note to the order form or email us
- 8 chapters to read and listen to
- Comprehension questions to check your understanding
- Italian/English glossary of ‘difficult’ terms for the level
- Suitable for students at any level
- Download your Free Sample Chapter (.pdf)
Buy Nuovo Cinema Paradiso, just £4.99! | Free sample chapter (.pdf) | Classic Italian Movies series | Catalog
Mario Monicelli’s 1958 classic comedy is now retold for learners of Italian: a gang of small-time criminals plan a night-time raid on the safe of a pawn-broker’s shop – with hilarious results!
- .pdf e-book (+ audio available free online)
- .mobi (Kindle-compatible) and .epub (other ebook readers) available on request at no extra charge – just add a note to the order form or email us
- 8 chapters to read and listen to
- Comprehension questions to check your understanding
- Italian/English glossary of ‘difficult’ terms for the level
- Suitable for students at any level
- Download your Free Sample Chapter (.pdf)
Buy I soliti ignoti, just £4.99! | Free sample chapter (.pdf) | Classic Italian Movies series | Catalog
How do I access my ebooks?
When your order is ‘completed’ (normally immediately after your payment), a download link will be automatically emailed to you. It’s valid for 7 days and 3 download attempts so please save a copy of the .pdf ebook in a safe place. Other versions of the ebook, where available, cannot be downloaded but will be emailed to people who request them. There’s a space to do that on the order form – where it says Additional information, Order notes (optional). If you forget, or if you have problems downloading the .pdf, don’t worry! Email us at the address on the website and we’ll help. Also, why not check out our FAQ?
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P.S. 
Did you read/listen to Tuesday’s FREE bulletin from EasyItalianNews.com?
No? Didn’t see it?
Subscribing to EasyItalianNews.com and so receiving each ‘easy news’ bulletin via email is FREE, too.
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