Italian Language Learning Reviews

Score: 8/10

Pros:
plentiful advanced readings in Italian; Italian language used for all instructions & examples; themed by region of Italy for a fuller picture of the country and the Italian language; plenty of exercises & activities related to the texts; can listen to “ascoltiamo!” sections online; grammar appendix does a great job of relating to readings & offering further exercises; uniquely, suggests further Italian internet resources in each chapter; glossary

Cons:
for later intermediate & advanced learners; primarily helps with reading & writing without making this focus clear; intended for classroom use (still mostly useful to individual learners); no index; price

Parola a te! presents itself as a journey through Italy’s multifarious regions in textbook form. At its heart, though, it’s an intermediate/advanced language reader, with reading comprehension selections along with questions and exercises that complement those readings.

In each chapter, you will learn about a different region of Italy. Readings – all in Italian – range from overviews of the society and culture of a region to perspectives on specific cities, people or aspects of Italian life (like cars). The depth of regional Italian culture gives the course a lot to draw from, but expect the readings to sound a bit “standard” (stale?) and newspaper/textbookish.

The interspersed exercises support students well as you read through the book. Some test your reading skills, others listening comprehension, some build vocabulary, and still others give you a sense of Italy’s immense diversity. From instructions to answers, these are all in Italian. Consistent prompts to work “in gruppi” suggest a classroom situation, whereas many of us are learning da solo.

An exceptional grammar appendix, the “appunti grammaticali”, links Italian grammar topics to each chapter, includes verb & pronoun tables, and offers additional exercises to test your understanding of each grammar point.

Unfortunately, you’ll find no index, but the table of contents is detailed enough to help you find specific readings. A short Italian-English vocabulary glossary will help with the readings, but you’re probably working with a good Italian dictionary at this point, right?

To be frank, the best way to learn (and conquer!) advanced Italian is to get out there, read and listen to things on your own. Still, for a structured, themed reading experience with activities and well-organized support, Parola a te! provides a good way to continue your Italian studies.

Score: 4/10

Pros:
modular formatting makes the structure of each lesson clear to students; at its best, presents acceptable dialogues, vocabulary & grammar topics; decent – albeit short and unenlightened – exercises, with an exercise key at the back; 20+ pages of cultural & tourist info regarding Italy in the book’s introduction; appendix with irregular verb charts (although missing some verb forms & even some common irregular verbs altogether); Italian-to-English glossary

Cons:
lack of an audio component limits the use of this kind of dialogue and vocabulary-driven course for beginners; long vocabulary lists; no index & uninformative table of contents; very uneven pacing of vocabulary & grammar material; missing essential grammar topics, conversational phrases & language functions more vital to a beginner’s success; dialogues not always relevant; explanations and examples don’t tie lessons together, often leaving learners in the dark; much better conversational courses with audio component available for purchase at only a slightly higher price

There are many Italian language lesson books crying out from the bookshelf, pleading with you to buy them. For the most part, you may notice that such coursebooks follow a standard formula: dialogue, vocabulary list, explanations of grammar & language topics, exercises. Few resources adhere to that more clearly than Hippocrene Beginners Series: Beginner’s Italian.

Uniquely, the author prefaces these lessons with more than twenty pages on Italian culture, history, art, economy, and practical information about travel to and around Italy. Then, after a very short introduction to pronunciation with an ad hoc transliteration system, the book turns its attention to the Italian language in ten routine lessons.

Every lesson begins with a one page dialogue in Italian. The next page, opposite the Italian, repeats the same dialogue in English. Turn the page, and you’ll find a two-column vocabulary list, usually a couple pages long. This is followed by a list of “locuzioni” (expressions, or phrases). Then there are exercises on the dialogue and vocabulary. Then, explanations of grammar and language functions. Finally, exercises dealing with the grammar and language topics. Note that each of these sections begins on a new page, which is among the cleanest formatting choices I’ve seen for this type of modular course.

The dialogues are fairly standard, ranging from stiffly informal to stuffily formal. While they manage to focus on material that is culturally relevant to Italy, you’ll often find yourself reading material you can’t imagine yourself hearing or saying in place of more crucial, basic language fundamental to everyday conversations. The accompanying vocabulary lists run long, making them hard to memorize for any particular purpose. What’s more, there are mistakes in the text of the dialogues. Further, the book comes with no CD or cassettes to perfect your pronunciation.

Explanations stay short and to the point. You’ll learn grammar topics randomly, and with no clear connection to the other material in the lesson, but you sometimes build on previous topics. Each topic gives a few explanatory sentences, interspersed with short Italian examples (with translations). You may find further vocabulary lists in the grammar sections, adding to the burden on your memory.

As you progress through the lessons, you cover fairly basic grammar material. You’ll deal with subject and object pronouns, nouns, present tense verbs, reflexive verbs, numbers, adjectives, adverbs, prepositions and conjunctions. Curiously, the tenth lesson panics, and throws pages of verb charts, along with information about irregular verbs, at you. Along the way, you’re offered minimal advice, sometimes even confusing advice, and left to figure a lot out for yourself.

The activities come in two types. The first reviews the dialogue material, asking you to “copy the text, read it aloud and translate it”, to make up Italian sentences using certain expressions, to translate a handful of phrases, and to memorize some phrases. The second set of exercises follows the grammar, and involves translating about ten sentences from English to Italian. All in all, the practice is conventional and short, but not bad.

There’s a key with answers to the exercises in the back, along with an appendix of some forms (often just the present indicative and preterite) of twenty irregular verbs, in lists with forms separated by commas and irregular forms underlined. The author also includes a ten page Italian-English vocabulary glossary.

The lack of an index and the meager table of contents means that you’ll have to flip through the book to deliberately find missing information.

Clearly, I’ve pointed out drawbacks to even the most positive components of these ten Italian lessons. That leads me to wrap up this review with a simple suggestion: self-taught students starting to learn to speak Italian should avoid Beginner’s Italian. It’s not a dire warning – this course isn’t that horrible, it’s just on the sour end of mediocre. Spend a bit more for a more favorable experience.

Score: 6/10

Pros:
deals with nearly every major grammar topic in beginning-intermediate Italian; engaging, informal, even funny text; explanations can be verbose, but rarely wander or distract – they stay focused; author intersperses Italian words in her explanations to ease transition to your new language; chapters combine grammar topics with everyday themes; extra notes give tips & info; multiple useful appendixes; glossary & index

Cons:
modest number of practice exercises in view of bulk of material presented; no audio CDs, tapes or sound files to help you pronounce the language; no dialogues, readings, or language immersion – focus on snippets of vocabulary and sentences; students looking for a conversation-based methods should consider this only as a supplement; long vocabulary lists without much context strain the memory; pronunciation key (transliteration) is the only pronunciation help you’ll get, and it’s mediocre

The Complete Idiot’s Guide to Learning Italian approaches the Italian language with the series’ trademark casual humor, extensive musings & hand-holding, and scattered note boxes with tips and information. In many ways, the book is a standard, themed course in Italian grammar, but done in the Idiot’s style.

The first few chapters give you helpful tips for learning the language, understanding a bit more about Italian and Italy, an intro to the Italian alphabet, and cognates (words in common) between Italian and English. The ad hoc pronunciation key taught with the alphabet accompanies all new vocabulary words in the rest of the lessons. While it’s not too accurate, you will learn to pronounce, say, “abbastanza bene” as ah-bah-stahn-zah beh-neh.

That brings us to chapter five. From here on out, chapters are structured around grammar topics, paired with real-life themes (hence titles like “Using the Modal Verbs at l’Hotel“, “Buon Viaggio: Travel Terms and the Imperative”, and “Made in Italia: Using Object Pronouns and Shopping”).

Sections within chapters introduce concepts in explanatory paragraphs. Tables of vocabulary lists or grammatical forms are mixed with these explanations, and some explanations are highlighted by example sentences. The author peppers her lighthearted explanations with Italian words, which, like the example sentences, are in italics.

Simple exercises follow some sections, often involving filling in blanks with the correct form, although you’ll probably wish the book offered more chances to practice along the way. Answers to the exercises are found in the first appendix.

As well as skimping on the exercises, these lessons contain less in the way of conversational material. Dialogues are nonexistent, vocabulary lists are often presented without much context and with the expectation that you memorize lists of terms. In fact, the only fluent Italian you’ll read that’s relevant to the chapter themes is found in the sample sentences that complement grammar and language explanations.

The consistent use of notes is helpful, although some provide mild distractions when they stray from the topic at hand. Notes clarify or emphasize important language topics, offer further guidance or simply share musings about Italian.

One appendix lists regular and irregular verbs in a slightly crowded but fully-formed table. Another gives four pages of idiomatic expressions in Italian, and even some tongue twisters for fun. A third appendix summarizes non-verb grammar topics in charts, and the fourth lists pages of Italian synonyms.

At the very end, you’ll find a somewhat lengthy English-Italian and Italian-English vocabulary glossary, and a useful index of grammar, language and thematic topics (so you can look up things like verb tenses, idiomatic expressions or banking). The table of contents also fully spells out chapters, sections and subsections with their titles and page numbers. The only thing missing, especially for such a comparatively long Idiot’s Guide, is page numbers next to vocabulary words in the glossary.

The Complete Idiot’s Guide to Learning Italian certainly has some notable features, and a semi-unique style that characterizes the course. If you’re looking for a way to study Italian grammar, pronunciation and vocabulary, this isn’t a bad way to go. True beginners might find the course demanding at times and soft at others (unevenly paced), overabundant in vocabulary lists, and lacking in practice exercises, pronunciation, and conversation drills. Students more comfortable with more conversation-driven methods should look elsewhere.

Score: 7/10

Pros:
ten themed lessons introduce a good – but not overwhelming – selection of everyday, casual Italian slang; not too bawdy or over-the-top, keeping it useful & realistic; dialogues showcase both the idiomatic & literal translations of Italian slang; routine exercises allow you to practice words you learn; glossary lists vocab words with example sentences & Italian synonyms

Cons:
not for beginners – you’ll learn vocabulary, but dialogues & exercises expect you to have a working knowledge of the language; since Italian slang is very region specific, it’s hard to study the Italian slang; no index; extended lessons in vocabulary only; no hand holding for those who need explanations or insights; you have to send away separately for the cassettes

There’s a seedier, mischievous side to Italian language learning books – the kind of book that teaches you slang, street lingo and naughty words. Street Italian 1 falls in that camp, teaching you Italian slang vocabulary in a way that’s more readable than vocabulary lists, and still “cleaner”, less outrageous and more useful than other slang guides and phrasebooks available.

In ten lezioni (lessons), you’ll encounter a range of everyday dialogues, vocabulary explanations and practice exercises. I can’t emphasize enough that vocabulary is the whole focus here. You won’t read explanations of grammar or structure, only learn slang ways of saying things in Italian. Because of this focus, the book cannot be used as a beginner’s course in Italian.

Lessons start with a comical drawing, theme in slang (like Francesca ha una cotta per Giovanni) and a dialogue. Dialogues are repeated three times on three pages. The first page gives the dialogue in Italian, with slang words & phrases conveniently bold (like ha una cotta). The second page sets out a translation of the dialogue, with the bold words in colloquial English (so “ha una cotta” is rendered has a crush). The third translates the bold terms literally (in the above case, the Italian literally means has a baking).

The next section, at the heart of the lesson, lists the slang vocabulary terms & expressions in dictionary-style entries. These include part of speech info, example sentences with translations, Italian synonyms, and other ways to use the word in question.

Finally, lessons end with practice exercises. These have you fill in blanks, match, and choose the right word, and even complete crosswords and word searches. It’s nothing new, but the activities help reinforce the vocab from each lesson as you learn. There are also two review exams (for lessons 1-5 and 6-10).

The end of the book has answers to the activities and an Italian slang glossary. The glossary is formatted like the vocabulary sections in each lesson, including sample sentences, synonyms and notes. Unfortunately, page or, at the very least, lesson numbers aren’t referenced, which could have made for a good index.

If you already have some experience in formal Italian, Street Italian 1 will supplement your core vocabulary with some colorful, useful slang. On top of that, its way of presenting vocabulary in dialogues and examples places it among the better vocabulary-building recommendations I’ve come across.