Italian Students (Lessons 1 & 2)

Hello! If you are reading this, you are successfully connected to the internet, or you are in posession of some strong mind-enhancers.

I hope it is the former, because I am going to post some interesting and helpful links that are related to our first two lessons at Bridge of Allan Library.

First, a little bit of light relief. Here is a video by the Italian animator Bruno Bozzetto. He is from Bergamo and made his reputation writing and drawing cartoons in the 1970s. More recently he has moved on to digital animation. This is one of his short cartoons, explaining subtly the differences between the Italians and other Europeans. The music and sound effects, by Roberto Frattini, are also wonderful.

Next we have an indispensible tool for the student of Italian: a good dictionary. While you will probably want to buy a small dictionary for 'out and about' use, I recommend Garzanti's website as one of the very best online solutions. You may be asked to register to use it, but it is free.

Even less exciting than the dictionary is the difficult issue of verbs. I have spotted a website that looks useful to me: verbs-online.com This will help you practice the conjugation of verbi regolari - regular verbs - in the presente - present tense -, which is all you have to worry about. For now...

I hope these things will prove useful to you. If you find anything else interesting on the internet that relates to the class, please use the comments below to tell me and your fellow students about it.

Buon lavoro!