Below is a list of Italian ‘animal words’, with English translations.
Now, what might you do with it?
Here’s a low-tec idea to start with:
1. Get a clean piece of A4 paper
2. Fold it, fold it again, and fold it a third time, so you have eight equal sections
3. Write an ‘animal category’ title in each section. For example: ‘pets’, wild animals’, ‘domestic animals’, ‘reptiles’, ‘animals used in food’, ‘animals used in transport’ and so on. The categories can be anything you want. If you can’t think of eight, leave a few blank ones – more ideas will come!
4. Go down the list and write the Italian words from the list below in whichever category seems appropriate (some words may go in multiple categories). You choose whether to also add the translations – I wouldn’t.
5. Now review your categories. Maybe you only have ‘pesce’ on its own (‘delfino’ is a mammal…) In which case, asssuming you care enough, why not go find some more words to accompany it? ‘Squalo’ is a good one! And any visit to Italy would surely be enhanced were you to acquire an encyclopedic knowledge of terms for fish and seafood…
6. Spend as much time adding words to your categories as pleases you. Online dictionariesa are an obvious resource, but not the only one. For instance, I typed ‘wikipedia.it pesce’ into my favourite search engine and came up with https://it.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pesce – it’s as dense as you’d expect from Wikipedia, but there are some fascinating diagrams with anatomical terms. For beginners, just looking at the pictures is a start – the captions are a rich source of ideas. Or find the word for ‘fishing’, then look for websites run by or for fishing-enthusiasts…
7. When you’re done researching and adding words to your categories, get a pair of scissors and cut your sheet of paper into strips, one for each category.
8. Pick a strip and review the words on it. Do another in a couple of hours, or tomorrow.
9. Put the categories where you have remembered ALL of the words in a separate pile. That way you’ll have one pile of categories still to study, and one pile of ‘done’ categories.
10. When you have remembered all the words in all the categories (good luck), fold up the slips neatly into an envelope, label it ‘animali’, and make a note to come back to review its contents in a week or so. Bus or train trips are good for this and, wow, you don’t even need to be online!
il cane [dog]
il gatto [cat]
il cavallo [horse]
il maiale [pig]
il coniglio [rabbit]
il tacchino [turkey]
il serpente [snake]
il cammello [camel]
l’elefante [elephant]
il pesce [fish]
la pecora [sheep]
il montone [ram]
la mucca [cow]
il toro [bull]
il criceto [hamster]
il delfino [dolphin]
la tartaruga [turtle / tortoise]
il leone [lion]
la farfalla [butterfly]
l’uccello [bird
il ghepardo [cheetah]
la tigre [tiger]
il topo [mouse]
il lupo [wolf]
il cervo [deer]
l’orso [bear]
lo scoiattolo [squirrel]
il cinghiale [wild boar]
For more animal words, see: Animali – 2