TodayWeeksReviewPracticePhrases

Standard Italian

What you see is what you say. The work is in the articles.

Ninety days, fifteen minutes each. Read one week at a time, say everything out loud, and come back each day for a short review of the words you have met. Italian is almost entirely phonetic — what you see is what you say — so speaking starts on day one. The work is in the seven ways to say the, and in a present tense that quietly does the job of the future.

The weeks

Seven days each, one after another. Each day opens when the one before it is done; each week when its seventh day is. If you would rather jump, any week can be skipped to from its page.

week1
Greetings, courtesy, numbers 1–20

Almost everything this week is a fixed chunk. Greetings are learned whole, not taken apart.

Noun · newVerb · newPronoun · newFixed chunk · new
week3
Common nouns: the home and food

Thirty-odd everyday objects, each learned with its article — and Italian has seven of those, so the article is the work.

NounVerbPronounArticlePrepositionAdjective · newQuestion word · newFixed chunk
week4
First sentence frames: I have, I want, I would like

You stop collecting words this week and start combining them. Almost no new vocabulary — reuse Weeks 1 to 3 inside these frames.

NounVerbPronounArticlePrepositionAdjectiveAdverb · newConjunction · newQuestion wordFixed chunk

By the end of week 4 you should be able to

  • —Greet, thank, apologise, and count to twenty.
  • —Introduce yourself — name, age, town, family, retirement — in four or five sentences.
  • —Name thirty-plus everyday home and food objects, with their article.
  • —Order a drink or a meal politely with vorrei, and ask for the bill.
week6
Questions: directions, prices, times

Magenta week. Seven question words, and enough fixed phrases to find a station, ask a price and understand the answer.

NounVerbAdjectiveAdverbArticlePronounPrepositionConjunctionQuestion wordFixed chunk
week7
The past: recounting yesterday

The passato prossimo. Two ingredients — a helper verb and a past participle — and you can talk about anything that has already happened.

NounVerbAdjectiveAdverbArticlePronounPrepositionConjunctionQuestion wordFixed chunk
week8
The near future, and joining sentences together

Italian barely needs a future tense for near plans — the present does the job. Connectors then turn a list of sentences into a story.

NounVerbAdjectiveAdverbArticlePronounPrepositionConjunctionQuestion wordFixed chunk

By the end of week 8 you should be able to

  • —Conjugate high-frequency verbs in the present for io, lei, lui/lei and noi.
  • —Ask for directions, prices and times using the question words.
  • —Recount yesterday in the passato prossimo, with both avere and essere.
  • —Talk about near-future plans using the present tense and a time word.
  • —Tell a short connected story using e, ma, perché, quindi, and prima / poi / dopo / infine.
week9
Your own life: hobbies, health and opinions

Phase 3 stops teaching structures and starts using them. This week also brings the one Italian verb that works backwards.

NounVerbAdjectiveAdverbArticlePronounPrepositionConjunctionQuestion wordFixed chunk
week10
Listening: following the gist

Mostly technique rather than vocabulary. The goal is the gist of a clip, not every word — and being comfortable with that is the actual skill.

NounVerbAdjectiveAdverbArticlePronounPrepositionConjunctionQuestion wordFixed chunk
week11
Speaking: five minutes a day, out loud

Fluency over accuracy. The aim is to keep talking, not to be right.

NounVerbAdjectiveAdverbArticlePronounPrepositionConjunctionQuestion wordFixed chunk
week12
A real task, and everything reviewed

No new grammar. One real thing done in Italian, and a look back over ninety days.

NounVerbAdjectiveAdverbArticlePronounPrepositionConjunctionQuestion wordFixed chunk

By the end of week 12 you should be able to

  • —Talk about your hobbies, your health and your opinions using piacere, adorare and the opinion frames.
  • —Follow the gist of a two-minute Italian clip using the three-step method.
  • —Deliver a five-minute monologue on the five-part scaffold, with discourse markers, without correcting yourself mid-sentence.
  • —Complete a real task in Italian — read a menu, write a message, or book a table.

The ninety days

Days 1–30

Foundations

Greet, introduce yourself, name everyday things, and order politely.

Days 31–60

Everyday exchanges

Hold a short two-way conversation without notes.

Days 61–90

Going it alone

Handle a real trip — travel, shops, small talk, the unexpected.

Starting later

What Italian will ask of you

Italian hands you speech almost immediately and then asks for patience with a single, very visible piece of bookkeeping. That trade is a good one at any age, and a particularly good one later.

You can be understood in the first week

Italian is essentially phonetic and its vowels are pure — exaggerate them and you sound better straight away. Early, unembarrassing success is not a small thing when starting later, because the reason most adults stop is confidence rather than capacity.

Seven ways to say the

Il, lo, la, l', i, gli, le, chosen by the sound that follows. That is a memorisation load rather than a rule to reason through, so no noun in this course ever appears without its article attached. You learn the pair, never the word alone.

The pronoun disappears

Parlo already means I speak, so io is usually dropped. That is one less word per sentence to produce, and it means blue appears far less often here than in French — when a pronoun does turn up it is carrying emphasis, which is worth noticing rather than ignoring.

The design behind this — expanding review gaps, chunking, and saying each thing more than one way — is covered on the front page, with the research it comes from. Vocabulary and knowledge hold up well with age; speed and working memory are what give way, so the course spends the first and protects the second.

Where Italian hides things

Piacere runs backwards

Mi piace il calcio is football is pleasing to me. The thing you like is the subject, so the verb agrees with it and not with you: mi piace il cinema, mi piacciono i libri. The same applies to mi fa male. Once you accept the structure it becomes automatic, but not before.

Seven ways to say the

Italian picks its article by the sound that follows: il, lo, l', la in the singular, i, gli, le in the plural. Lo and gli go before s+consonant, z, gn and ps — lo sport, lo stomaco, gli studenti. Learn every noun with its article attached and you will never have to work it out.

The article stays with the possessive

La mia casa, il mio libro — Italian keeps the definite article in front of the possessive, unlike French and Spanish. The exception is a single family member: mia madre, mio figlio, with no article. Add one back the moment it becomes plural: i miei figli.

The disappearing pronoun

Italian normally drops io, tu and lei because the verb ending already carries them. Blue appears far less often than in French. When a pronoun does show up, it is there for emphasis — io pago, I'll pay — which is worth noticing rather than ignoring.

The voice

Every word on the site is clickable. It speaks through a voice installed on this computer, so it costs nothing and works with the wifi off — but it does need a Italian voice to be installed. Without one the audio stays silent rather than read Italian aloud in an English accent.

[Ciao]

Looking for voices…