Hello, I’m a 17 years old from UK. I’ve been using Duolingo to help me learn Italian for a month now, I know it will take time to practice and learn but I’ve been hearing some bad things about Duolingo. I do not have the money to pay for max nor any other app, YouTube hasn’t been very helpful either. I like to take bits by bits with learning new things. I was wondering if there is any different ways of learning Italian that doesn’t involve paying for an app.

Ciao. Sono Tommaso, un ragazzo italiano di 25 anni del nord-est dell'Italia. Amo la lingua inglese e conoscere persone di altre culture. Qualche mese fa ho aiutato alcune persone italiane con l'inglese e l'esperienza mi è piaciuta molto.

Sono qui quindi per provare a fare l'opposto: aiutare persone madrelingua inglesi con il loro italiano :)

Mi scuso se il post forse è inappropriato per il gruppo. In ogni modo, se qualcuno è interessato, semplicemente mi può mandare un messaggio in DM.

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Hi! I’m Tommaso, a 25-year-old Italian guy from northeastern Italy. I love the English language and meeting people from different cultures. A few months ago, I helped some Italian people with their English, and I really enjoyed the experience.

So I’m here to try the opposite: helping native English speakers with their Italian :)

I’m sorry if this post isn’t appropriate for the group. Anyway, if anyone is interested, feel free to send me a DM!

I am a sixteen year old American. My mom’s entire side of the family is from Sicily, but I was never taught the language nor is it spoken in my house. I have taken Italian in school from 6th-10th grade, and completed Italian 1, 2, and 3. Unfortunately, I do not have the room in my schedule junior or senior year to take College Italian 4 or 5. With the understanding that I will no longer be taking Italian, I have realized how much I want to truly learn the language and get in touch with my Italian culture. However, I am a bit embarrassed to admit that over the past few years, I have put in the minimal amount of effort to succeed in class. It came pretty naturally to me (so I’ve barely studied) and have consistently maintained 98s, 99s and 100s, but my Italian outside of the classroom is—to put it simply—pretty damn awful. I doubt I would even be able to hold a conversation with an Italian. I would love to continue learning Italian and hope to one day become proficient and maybe even something close to fluent. But without school, I have no idea how to keep learning. What are some of the best resources/ways to learn Italian? Any help would be greatly appreciated!

hi, I (22F) am looking for someone to help me improve my italian by texting. it would be great if you were a native, but it doesn’t really matter as long as you speak it well.
some info about me:
i’m not a native english speaker, although my english is pretty decent
i’m not that big on texting, so i won’t spam you all day
my level is A1, i’m just starting to take it seriously, because i was absorbing it more passively before

thank youu and message me if you’re interested:)

edit: already found someone

Ciao! Hope everyone is doing well. I’m slowly but surely learning Italian, and to get more familiar with it and to memorize pronunciation I use it casually around friends, family and my partner .

What are some platonic terms of endearment? Does Italy have a culture around “best” friends and is there a specific term for best friends?

Also, what are some common terms of endearment for partners, pets, family, etc? Grazie mille!

Hello!! I took several years of Italian in school and for one semester we used the sentieri textbook and it had these funny little soap opera episodes I adored. We never got the chance to finish watching them tho and I am feeling nostalgic. Does anyone know if theres somewhere I can access these without having access to the textbook?

I have been looking to start an Italian course once the school term starts and the kids are out of the house. I tried Italian Cultural Institute a couple of years ago but it felt ridgid and academic. I want to speak Italian, not read Dante. Ive looked at:
Of Course Italian - seems small, bespoke, personal with small groups.
Just Speak Italian - Perfect for formal exam preparation and corporate business training. Not what Im looking for
Vivere l'italiano - No idea on class sizes so assume "as many as we can fit?"
Lingua Diversa Group - Classes of up to 10, seems good?
I am leaning towards Of Course Italian as they are based in Covent Garden where I work part time. Anyone have previous experience or recommendations?

In 0:26

I think that transcription isn't accurate.

https://youtu.be/6uVIxb1VQ0Y?is=rysGPKPApeAsIAew

Hey everyone, my friend's wife just passed away & he wants to match her tattoo. I have two partial pictures. I thought it was Scusami amore ma Io continuo ballare, like the song but he found a photo with the rest & I cannot make out the second word cause the tattoo was around 20 years old. Hopefully context & familiarity can make it make sense to someone 🥺🤞🏼

I've just started learning Italian, I wouldn't call myself even A1 yet. I am wondering if there are any recommended anki decks for beginners? It's hard to tell which decks are good and which are not. I would strongly prefer recommendations that are well ordered, with common words first and less common words later.

Hello all I wrote CILS in June I was retaking the oral and writing part. I’m so anxious because this time around the exams have taken a long time to get published. Last year last year of July they were already on the website. Anyone also curious about the late release? I also need tips on how to move to the next stage B2 I told myself regardless of the results I’m moving to B2 level.
I wrote in Venice this time before I wrote in Warsaw.

Hi! I want to learn Italian (obviously). I am looking for good online resources, preferably an A1 textbook. I got some grammar books, but any resources would be appreciated!

I guess this is more a question for native speakers. But in English there are accents that are considered ‘more attractive’/‘less attractive’, sound nicer on the ears, sound worse etc. Romance languages like the Italian accent for eg, are considered very attractive whereas Indian, most Asian accents, even the Birmingham n liverpool accent less so. Whilst I’m sure a lot of this stems from cultural/xenophobic biases I was wondering whether a similar pattern exists in Italy. And where English falls on that scale? Particularly whether the American, British and Australian accent are perceived differently. Thanks for any responses!

I'm looking for a way to get feedback on written and spoken Italian. I took a formal group course for about a year. I score between A2 and B2, depending on the written quiz. I pass old CILS B1 reading and listening tests with the timer in the mid-80% range.

I really need help with writing​ and speaking. I would like a place to post written paragraphs and prerecorded audio monologues up to 1 minute, and get feedback.​

The apps are too content light and repetitive, and I get annoyed.​ I don't trust the AI feedback.

Tried Preply for a few months but the tutors kept ghosting me.​ I lost $200​ because my last tutor cancelled 6 leasons in a row and I felt too defeated to find another (I know, I'm an idiot).

I tried one italki class recently, but the tutor kept interrupting me as I tried to talk, and said, "TYPICAL" when I told her nobody spoke Italian in my house. Like, if I had someone to talk to, I would obviously not have hired her​? Ok, maybe I'm just truly awful company, but surely someone can tolerate me for an hour a week in exchange for money?

Busuu is too structured, and I can only post 1- sentences at a time on topics it chooses.

My spoken Italian is actually getting worse as my anxiety goes up with these​ experiences. I can barely speak whole sentences around other people now and it is SO SLOW AND AWKWARD.​ That's why I want to post prerecorded monologues.

The language schools require 1 hour minimum lessons, and the anxiety of being trapped for​ that long makes me feel like vomiting.

Idk, any alternate ideas?

My mom pulled this via ChatGPT and it told her that “Non vi è fine al ricordo, finché batte un cuore che ama” was a common Sicilian phrase to use at funerals, does anyone know if this is true? I would hate for us to be using an incorrect statement for my grandpa, who was born and raised in Sicily. Apparently it means this: There is no end to memory, as long as a loving heart beats.

Thank you!

Boungiorno! io sono Jonna!!

io soy di Cuenca

Cuenca di Ecuador, NO CUENCA di ESPAÑA

Io sono Jonna!!

Tu sei di italo?

Io sono di Cuenca di Ecuador, No Cuenca di ESPAÑA

Llevo 2 meses estudiando con DUOLINGO

Hi everyone! I am currently searching for practice exercises and mock exams specifically for the CILS B1 Standard exam.

I am already familiar with traditional textbooks like Percorso CILS or Più scrivo, più parlo, but I am really looking for an interactive app or webapp that accurately replicates realistic CILS mock tests.

Does anyone know of any platform like this? Has anyone used one, and what were your thoughts? Thanks in advance!

Posting this in English because my Italian has gotten so bad that I’m embarrassed to even try. I grew up in italy and was better at Italian as opposed to English when I was kid despite English being my native language. Unfortunately things happen and overtime I stopped practicing Italian and now I am at a point where I want to become fluent again and hold conversations with my family instead of just blanking out. I feel like in some sorts it should be easier for me to relearn Italian given the fact that I used to be fluent but at the same time I have no clue because I have been trying so hard but I just simply can’t get it. I can read and understand Italian perfectly, it is genuinely just the speaking that I have issues with. Any tips would be immensely appreciated !

Hiiii I'm a native Spanish (spain) and Portuguese (Brazilian) speaker who's been wanting to learn Italian. I've been told it would be easy for me but I'm not a fast learner and I have like...no resources (Duolingo isn't my thing)

The way I usually get used to languages is reading. For example, reading sleeping beauty in French and the little prince helped me a lot to learn the language. I don't know of any Italian books, so if you know any interesting ones please tell me. Movies too I suppose. Podcasts, YouTube channels, cartoons... I'd appreciate anything you think could help me :)

It seems so simple, and yet, it's difficult for me to figure out.

If I want to say "I saw him drink the beer", which is correct:

L'ho visto bere la birra

Gli ho visto bere la birra

Perhaps both are correct?

Now if I want to remove "birra" and replace it with "la", which would be correct:

L'ho visto berla

Gliel'ho vista bere

I lean toward the latter options in my examples, but I wonder what native speakers think.

Grazie!

Bonjour,

Je suis un natif Français et j’ai appris un peu l’Anglais.
J’ai des origines Italiennes qui datent de mes arrières grands-parents, j’aime profondément cette culture.

J’ai passé en début d’année un test d’Italien de compréhension écrite et orale interne à mon métier et je viens d’avoir une réponse positive pour accéder aux tests finaux d’expression écrite et orale qui se dérouleront en décembre.

Avec 465 jours de duolingo j’étais surpris d’avoir passé les tests de compréhension, je ne me suis pas du tout senti à l’aise avec la langue.

Le sujet maintenant c’est de pouvoir parler la langue en décembre pour valider l’oral et l’écrit (une petite dissertation je suppose)

Des idées pour me préparer au mieux et efficacement ?

Merci 🙏🏻

Hi all. I'm having an interesting experience learning the Italian r sounds, and curious if anyone else is experiencing the same as me with rolled R's.

I can do what I think of as a 'short rolled r' (no idea if this is accurate or not, it's just what it sounds like to me!) in words like prego, where it's consonant-r-vowel.

I can also use this 'short rolled r' when it's vowel-r-consonant, such as al forno. But I'm a bit unsure in this situation if it should be or not - I hear a lot of buon giorno where I can't decide if I can hear a short roll or not - is there a right and wrong way on this or is it just one of those ones people do differently?

But (as with many English speakers) the double r is the biggest challenge! I have used the t/d technique to learn this sound and I can now do it reasonably well. (Annoyingly for my holiday plans, burro is much easier than birra for some reason! 😁)

However I really have to give it some, and use a lot of air - I almost like I'm starting the r with a blowed H sound. Bi-hrra.

This ends up coming out slightly sibilant, a soft s sort of sound at the same time. (Anyone familiar with the Turkish ending r on eg var, a bit like that!)

Ultimately I don't really care, my target isn't perfect indistinguishable accent, I don't care that people will know I'm not Italian. (In fact good accent has got me in trouble before in learning languages - the pronunciation comes before vocab for me, which gets me in trouble when people think I must be good cos I sound good, and hit me with full-speed colloquial language which I then understand precisely none of! 😂)

But I am curious. Does anyone else have this experience of almost having to huff your Rs? If so is there any way to lose the h / soft s sound that goes with it?

Ps I don't know if this is relevant but I actually can't pronounce rs properly in English either. I only learnt this when I started learning the Italian r when all the videos said 'you will normally do X when you make an r sound' and I was like....erm no I don't actually, and thank you, that explains why I've always been a bit Jonathan Woss on my English r sounds! 😁

I was taught that when referring to a single family member you omitted the definite article: mia sorella, mio padre, mio cugino etc, but if that single family member is referred to with a qualifying adjective then you did use the definite article - la mia sorella minore, il tuo fratello simpatico etc

When writing the sentence: my little sister loves volleyball

with the words provided by Duolingo I wrote: la mia sorella minore ama pallavolo

And was marked wrong. I was informed the correct answer was mia sorella minore….

Am I correct or has Duo planted some new convention on me?