Buondì.

While driving Bug to the petting zoo this morning, after a particularly disrupted night of not-much-sleep, I had an epiphany.

Today I’m supposed to be preparing an ‘eBook of the Week’ offer, then writing an interesting and entertaining article, and then packing for a trip we’re taking this week.

During the trip I’d then be writing other interesting and entertaining articles, as well as dealing with customer service pleas for help from people who know not how to use their iPads nor, apparently, how to read instructions or FAQ pages.

Before setting out into the traffic with our valuable consignment this a.m., I was irritably dealing with one such breakfast-time email (“I pressed the download link three times but nothing happened!”) when Stefi asked me some innocent question, and I snapped at her.

Can’t you see I’m working? etc.

In the car we had one of those ‘what’s the point of it all’ conversations, during which it occurred to me that I’d likely feel happier this week – and less stressed while hanging around in airports and driving rental cars for hours – if I had less to do.

And the epiphany?

That it was entirely up to me to decide to do less, and so be a more pleasant person to be around.

So, I did.

At least for a few days, I won’t be flogging ebooks. My apologies to anyone who was hoping for another bargain.

And I’ll be going easy on the article writing (starting just minutes from now…)

Instead of ‘witty and interesting’, I’ll be spending three articles drawing your attention to stuff on the club website that you might not have seen.

After which I’ll go for a walk, get some fresh air, listen to the radio, and so on, instead of sitting in an armchair for hours with a laptop perched on my knees, getting chilly.

OK, so here we go!

On the club website, in the menu, there’s a clickable item which looks like this:

SIX LEVELS!

Click on it, or on my reproduction above, and you’ll arrive at a page with this text:

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Levels & Level Test

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Pretty self-explanatory, I’d have throught. But a couple of words of warning!

The level test is done using very old ‘tech’ and so is often misunderstood. Re-doing it has been on my list for a decade, but so have a thousand other things.

Personally I wouldn’t bother with it, as it doesn’t include any of the important stuff like listening and speaking. The article ‘What’s my level in Italian?’ is much more useful.

But if you’re curious, be my guest. Remember, though, you have to PRESS THE GREY BUTTONS to make it work. You wouldn’t believe how many people don’t, then write to me, all frustrated, “The level test doesn’t work!”

E poi, below the level test where it says “If you already know your level, click the link and start studying”, clicking on those links will take you to HUNDREDS, EVEN THOUSANDS of pages of useful stuff.

But it’s down to you to decide what to do with it. Some people find that an obstacle. To which I say, if you’re not willing to make decisions about your own learning, go pay a teacher to do it for you (but let the buyer beware!)

So, focus on grammar? Focus on listening? Do exercises?

It’s your call.

The club is not an app, so doesn’t dictate that you have to do this before you can do that. It’s assumed that different visitors will have different needs and preferences.

The original idea was simply to provide free material that learners could use to progress with, in whichever way suited them best.

If it was me, I’d play about, trying different things, until I found something I enjoyed doing that gave me a sense of progress.

For instance, I might start with the lowest level listening exercises and work up through the levels gradually, until I could actually understand at least some of what I was hearing.

I might even look at the grammar lessons, though not with any great expecations that reading about prepositions, tenses and the like would actually help me speak and understand the language.

E così.

So that was today’s tip.

Bug’s off to the canile for a week (not this one, but it’s cute so I thought they deserved a link.)

This time tomorrow morning we’ll be somewhere high up over northern Europe!

And I’ll be back Wednesday, with another brief-ish ‘stuff you could easily found for yourself if you’d looked’ article, dedicated to iPad users everywhere.

A mercoledì.