Want to Improve your Italian? Tips for learning the Language of Love!

Looking to learn Italian or improve the little that you already know? Italian tutor, Irene, has some great language learning tips to supercharge your Italian or any other language you may be studying!

Learning a new language can be hard and discouraging at first, especially when learning it from scratch. You have to learn new grammar, memorise vocabulary and practise listening.

But…if you are committed, and if you follow the right strategy, it can be a very enriching and rewarding experience.

Students frequently ask me ‘What’s the best way to learn Italian and how long will it take me to be fluent?’. That’s a tricky question, with no specific answer. Each individual student might have a different approach to learning a language depending on different factors including time, age of the student, prior linguistic knowledge, and motivation.

Even so, I do have some tips to share which many of my students have found effective in learning Italian:

• Set yourself language-learning goals. Ask yourself "what do I want to achieve?". Depending on the reason why you decided to learn or improve your Italian, set yourself some goals. For example, if you are learning Italian for your GCSE or A Level exam, plan to study 30-50 words and do one paper a week; this will help you develop the necessary skills (listening, reading, speaking and writing). Furthermore, you will be able to focus on the main objectives and to achieve them without feeling too stressed when the exam is approaching.

• Look for a private tutor or enrol yourself in a course. Both ways are very effective and will be a great support through your learning process. Joining a course will give you the opportunity to be part of a learning community. However, if you choose the path of looking for a tutor to help you learning the language, you will receive a more personal and tailored approach.

• Make use of the great amount of free resources online. If you are looking for a free of cost approach, the internet is the right place for you! It will be able to give you all the support you need; from podcasts to free online lessons and videos. There are also plenty of apps that can be useful to learn Italian such as Memrise, Duolingo and Babbel.

• Seek out real-life practice. Interacting in the new language is key — find native speakers near you or, even better, travel to Italy for some real practice!

Keep your motivation up. As I mentioned before, motivation is very important throughout the whole learning process. You might be learning Italian for work, study or because some members of your family speak the language. There might be times where you want to give up or feel like you’re not going anywhere. That’s the right moment to remind yourself about the reason you are learning the language and...never give up!

Buona fortuna! (Good luck!)

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Blog Post Crafted by Irene

Irene has been teaching Italian privately for over ten years. She teaches conversational and business Italian as well as leading group classes. She also has experience of tutoring Italian to A-Level and GCSE standard.