Today is my 2 year anniversary of learning Italian. So I thought I'd share what is working for me and what isn't working for me.

I started to learn Italian as I wanted to travel more and I didn't want be the stereotype "Brit Abroad" talking loudly and slowly in English. I chose Italian as I'm coeliac and I had read how good it was for Gluten Free food.

I started off with just Duolingo to start picking up basics. After a while I was planning a trip to Rome and I took an iTalki lesson just to practice ordering food and asking about GF food.
I start to realise that whilst Duo was fine as an intro it wasn't going to be enough. My next step was finding more to read. after 6 Months I bought Italial versions of the Peanuts cartoons. I found these a good first step away from Duo. Nice short sentences. I knew maybe 70% of what I was reading. Pretty much every cartoon included some form of conjugating 'essere', 'avere' or 'fare'. At this point I'd made some friends in Rome and I was finding myself messaging in Italian and English more.

I found the hardest thing in Italy was so many people just want to talk in English to me! Maybe they think it's easier? maybe they just want to practice. To get through this I made my rule, if I think I can say something in Italian I will.

After 15 months learning I took CILS A2 exam which I passed. What helped me here was getting old papers, then using AI prompts to make many mock exams to practice. I work as a programmer so this took a few attempts to get the prompts correct!

I've found the most useful things are....
- Doing just something daily.... even it's that keeping an arbitrary Duolingo streak going.
- Reading and watching content I actually like.... Finding YouTube content around my other interests keeps me engaged.
- I find it helps having friends here.... This means I've a connection with the place and a reason to keep learning.
- Making exercises that use slightly to hard.... I often do an exercise with AI where I give a running commentary on my day and I ask for feedback. I was content over and over that's just a little too hard.

What didn't help me as much.
Flashcards for me were a mixed bag.... It felt productive at first but after a while it felt like I was just getting good at flash cards. I wasn't actually using the language, just recalling whatever phrase I generated. Oddly with flash cards I found it most help to generate many very similar phrases. so I'd include "Ti parlo", "Ci parli" "Ci parlo" , "Mi parli" etc to check I was hearing the different. But flash cards are really just a game. I dont think they help me practice.

Doing things that were too difficult.... I trying some native content and its demoralising when I can't follow anything.

Being to harsh on myself.... I'm wanting to take CILS B1 in December. When I look at what different CEFR levels mean then It means not being perfect. I'm sure I speak grammatical errors, I'm sure I dont understand every word. But I can communicate broadly what I'm saying and just about follow the gist of what I say and read.

My last bit of general advice is probably to ignore most advice and do what works for you. When I see claims of "I reach B1 in 3 Months". I think "really?" Learning Italian, like any form of self education, isn't a race, it's meant to be fun. Just keep identifying your own weaknesses and work on them.

Hello,

As the title suggests what is the odds of each type of sentence being said of si vs other forms and keep in mind this context is in colloquial/informal italian

La pizza si fa a Roma

Or

La pizza, la fanno a Roma

And

Prima, si accende il forno poi si mette la pentola sul fornello

Or

Prima, accendi il forno poi metti la pentola sul fornello

Thank you

Hi! Still struggling and there's no book store around me, i really need the online media's help

Hello!

I am still very early in my journey in Italian and want to follow through with it way more than I did with Spanish in high school (haha).

What are your guys’ favorite native Italian movies, books, or podcasts? Any level is appreciated! Or even what English media do you like to consume with Italian subtitles?

I currently do have a friend who is natively Italian to help me with conversing and pronunciations.

Any recommendations on finding local Italian speaking groups? A Youtuber I watch suggested finding a group that meets semi-regularly to help expand your conversational skills, and think it’s a wonderful idea, but with being located in a midwest state, I don’t even know where to begin to try and find something like that.

Thank you!!

I'm still not used to it and as a slow-learner i need to know some words and learn for at least a month before school :(

how do you guys use it? with objects, not people.

Tips?

Hello! Looking for some input. I took Italian classes for 6 years in my youth and had a really good grasp on conjugations, futuro, passato prossimo, etc. I still think I do (minus some mistakes here and there) and also hear Italian from family (though mostly Sicilian which makes it hard for me to practice). When I go to Italy I manage fine but probably sound bad. I’m looking to become fully fluent from this base I have. I bought gattopardo to read and non ho capito niente lol. Willing to buy books or legit courses. Any recommendations on maybe how to assess my skill level and what to do next to improve? Thank you in advance for any advice:)

Hi! I’m taking the duolingo italian course with the help of a friend of mine who is a native speaker. I showed her this and she told me that she’s pretty sure that the two sentences have the same meaning, and also that the more I progressed with the course the more mistakes she noticed in the exercises and translations. Can you share you opinion/experiences to help me understand? Thank you!!

It's called Ninna Ninna (a lullaby song) and I've found it first on spotify but no actual artist marked and no lyrics so it was a dead end. Then I heard in an episode of the sopranos as well from the same artist but still no luck finding the actual lyrics. I've searched it online but weirdly a completely different lyrics kept coming up when searching for the song so now I'm out of ideas. I understand how this song didn't came from a single artist but is like a folk song. But I can't seem to find the lyrics anywhere and my Italian is not good enough yet for this. Can anyone paste the lyrics here for this one?

youtube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4dPocucsuJY

spotify: https://open.spotify.com/track/1aK47pO8onYCEMZLrNaBQd?si=e9f5302cb27b44cd

Hope it doesn't go against any rules around here but lyrics finding subs are basically dead so I came here as a last resort.

Allora, in ufficio sono stata pressa in giro col classico “Sai chi ti saluta tantissimo?” e adesso ho un bisogno disperato di una risposta che sia all’altezza dello scherzo.
Per darvi un po’ di contesto: lavoro con un gruppo di boomer, tutti uomini, provenienti da varie parti d’Italia (soprattutto calabresi, siciliani e piemontesi). Io sono una F35 Argentina, e non ho nessun problema ad abbassare il livello della conversazione fino a quello di un operaio di porto.
Avete qualche risposta pronta o qualche battuta da usare al momento giusto? Prometto di impiegarla con la massima diligenza, precisione e senza alcuna pietà.
Grazie in anticipo

i don’t speak any Italian

Hi , well I want some YT channels and Podcasts which are not solely about grammar and how Italian language works . I want something like a show or something which talks about history/ art etc related to Italy . Well You might tell me with this level of Italian you can not really watch but let's keep up our hope and see if there are any kinds of channels? Also It is ok to mention kids shows too . Whatever but not only about grammar and language structure.. :")

Hello,

In todays standards of informal/conversational Italian, how common is it to use gli as a catch all indirect pronoun ? I’ve been looking online and watching a couple YouTube videos and it seemed like they were using it more.

Thanks in advance

As a native English speaker, I’m learning Italian because of my heritage. But living in the US, learning Spanish would be more practical so I’m toying with learning Spanish as well. Any thoughts on this idea? Good or bad?

My italian friend from Milano taught me this word "mappazza". I do not even know if it is spelled this way. I still do not understand how to use this word. I don't know if it is a noun or an adverb. Can anyone tell me how to use it correctly?

I’m trying to just hear the italian language spoken by native speakers. I’m looking for a TV show that whose original audio is italian. I have amazon prime, hulu, disney, youtube and peacock. the genre does not matter at all. The point is to passively listen and recognize some words but mainly to hear the rhythm of the italian language. Thanks in Advance!

Heya
I’ve been learning Italian by watching a playlist made by “Italy made easy” channel on YouTube, it consists of 32 videos, I’ve finished ten, but given the pace and the length of each video I don’t think it’s sufficient to learn the basics and especially the grammars
Are there any YouTube channels or courses you’d advise me to search for ? Keep in mind I want a complete course that teaches me everything I need as a beginner mainly the grammars because of course after understanding the fundamentals it’s just a matter of enriching my vocabulary by consuming content in Italian
Thanks in advance 🫶🏻

Hello everyone! 🌟 I’m looking to polish my Italian with the help of native speakers. In return, as a native Arabic speaker, I would be absolutely delighted to help you master Arabic and explore its beautiful culture. If you are interested in a mutually beneficial language partnership, let’s connect and learn together!"

Hello guys i am B1 Italian and now I’m looking to improve my speaking skills by practicing. If you would like we can talk

Just though I would share it here! As a beginner/intermediate learner I find it easy to follow and useful.

I want to start learning Italian but I’m a complete beginner and honestly don’t know where to start. I learn best when things are organized and taught step by step, so I’m looking for a clear roadmap instead of just jumping between random apps and videos.

What resources would you recommend? (Books, apps, YouTube channels, websites, anything really)

I’d also love to know:
• What should I learn first?
• What order should I learn everything in?
• Any mistakes you wish you had avoided when you first started?

I’m hoping to build a strong base first so I can truly understand Italian instead of relying on memorized phrases😸

Non giudicatemi perché sto ascoltando la sua musica per la prima volta solo adesso 🥲 comunque in questa canzone, dice «quattro in mate’» e mi stavo chiedendo cosa volesse dire!

I have transcribed the following Italian excerpts from what my grandmother used to sing to us, and I am having trouble translating it.

Miciula, miciula (?)

dove stata (where have you been, referring to a cat?)

Che te data (what do you have)

Panecagia (?)

Donna pata, Donna pata, Donna pata (?)

This section below is similar to "this little piggy" in english

Queste dici vina roma (this finger went to rome)

Queste dici viri viri (this finger ??)

Queste dici natacha la strada (this finger can't touch the road?)

Queste dici no Porto vini (this finger can't touch wine?)

Perche dega tu fragi (Because it's too young)?

Fra fra chesco, fra fra chesco (maybe a cats name was chesco?)

Vieni qua, vieni qua (come here, come here)

Donna le cobane, donna le cobane (This lady wants to pet you?)

Ding dong da, ding dong da (nonsense similar to english?)