I detest going to the post office in Italy. Absolutely hate it. Loathe it. So I was tempted to give today’s Italian Conversation a really snide title. But I managed to resist. Actually, I’m still struggling with the urge to be sarcastic. But maybe you really LIKE going to the post office? In which case, […]
Latest Italian Conversation – audio plus transcript
Today’s free Italian exercise is another in our Italian Conversations series. You get to listen to the dialogue, then read the transcript. Simple, but hopefully useful. Before you click away, just a note about the audio quality – we’ve finally understood what has been causing the problem (upgrading our computer to Windows 10), but haven’t yet […]
Online lessons offer ends today (& why you should try one!)
This is the FINAL day of our online Italian lessons promotion. So there was me, scratching around for a subject line that would be more original than ‘Online lessons offer ends today’. I considered ‘Buy now or forever hold your peace‘, but then put it aside because it didn’t seem like such a great idea. […]
Made a complete mess of this one (and now I know why!)
Today’s grammar exercise is on ‘si spersonalizzante’, which I guess you could translate as something like “de-personalizing ‘si’”. You can try it here. While I know what it means, and even how to spell it, I admit I made a complete mess of this one. Just seven out of twelve at first try, little better […]
Prepositions exercise + last days of online lessons offer!
Today I have another free Italian grammar exercise for you – more practice on prepositions, which is always useful! As usual, there are twelve sentences to complete with the correct preposition. If you already have a good level in Italian, you could think of it as a diagnostic test to help you spot any gaps […]
Online lessons FAQ (& pronomi e aggettivi indefiniti)
If you’re not familiar with the acronym FAQ, it stands for ‘Frequently Asked Questions’. Italians use it too (they pronounce it ‘fak’…) So today, given our current offer on online Italian lessons, we’ll start with some of the things people always ask me. After that, I’ll be reminding you of how to get started with […]
You learn something new every day – if you let yourself!
Today’s Italian grammar exercise is on ‘modi indefiniti‘. If you’re thinking ‘what are they?’, be aware that everyone else reading probably is too. Curious, I Googled the term and found an explanation on Italian Wikipedia. If you’re not (yet) confident about reading Italian, here’s a rough translation: The ‘modo indefinito’ is a form of the verb […]
Nice & easy exercise + Online Italian Lesson Promotion
Today we have a nice & easy Italian exercise on ‘Il participio passato’, plus the start of the promised promotion on online Italian lessons. What first? Well, the offer, of course! Here’s a discount code which’ll get you 20% off the price of 1, 5, 10 or more lessons with one of our team of […]
Exercise on Italian gerunds + What sort of learner are you?
You know that old saying about ‘doctors making the worst patients’? Well that’s me: I’m a teacher who hates being taught! I just don’t have the patience for it, and anyway, tend to assume I know better and could get there quicker on my own… I don’t suppose it’s true, but that’s the sort of learner […]
Danger! Unexploded prepositions!
Today’s free grammar exercise offers a useful review of prepositions, one of those minefields in which you are most likely to foul up when trying to actually speak Italian. The problems with prepositions (and with many other grammar areas) stem from the differences between Italian and the student’s own language, and from something called a ‘transfer […]