Fluenz Version F2: Italian 1+2 (Win/Mac) with software DVDs, audio CDs, and Navigator. Learn Italian with the latest upgrade.

by Fluenz

Product Features

• 60 sessions of up to two and one-half hours each -- the most comprehensive software application covering the first and second levels of Italian anywhere. Fluenz Italian 1+2 will guide you in English through the challenges of Italian with a proven system.
• Language tutor Sonia Gil guides you on video every step of the way, recreating a one-on-one tutoring experience, utilizing explanations in English, placing you in real-world contexts, and immersing you in the culture.
• Fluenz blends beautiful full-motion video with a range of engaging, interactive workouts to improve your reading, writing, listening, and speaking skills -- including a recording engine to perfect your accent.
• Fluenz's unique approach is currently being used by elite units of the US Navy, senior personnel at the UN and UNICEF, executives of Fortune 500 companies, and students at Harvard Business School and other leading universities.
• Includes the Fluenz Italian 1 and 2 DVD-ROMs, two audio CDs for additional learning, and the handy Fluenz Navigator for on-the-go referencing of important words and phrases.

Product Details

• Product Dimensions: 5 x 5 x 5 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.5 pounds
• ASIN: B001GBZALQ
• Date first available at Amazon.com: September 10, 2008
• Average Customer Review: 4.3 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (29 customer reviews)
• Amazon Bestsellers Rank: #389 in Software (See Top 100 in Software)

  #39 in	Software > Language & Travel
  #3 in	Software > Education & Reference > Foreign Languages > Italian

Product Description

Amazon.com

The only interactive language program offering an immersive environment that recreates the best elements of great one-on-one tutoring.

Be Fluent in Italian
The Harvard, Cornell, and University of Chicago graduates who developed Fluenz were determined to create a program that conveyed the unique beauty of Italian while providing a step-by-step path through the language. By bringing the magic of a great teacher to the computer screen, Fluenz Italian makes reaching fluency in this storied language possible for every single learner.

How Fluenz gets you there: A real on-screen tutor who guides you every step of the way. Using English to help you learn Italian. Teaching relevant material from the very beginning.

The Most Comprehensive Program to Learn Italian

Love Italian, Actually Learn It
As strong believers in the magic of Italian, the program designers moved beyond the cookie-cutter approach typical of computer language education: methods that boast a suspiciously simple way to learn and treat adults like children by emphasizing the association of words and pictures. Instead of the "fast-food" approach to Italian, Fluenz is all about taking learners step by step through the most beautiful language in the world.

Fluenz Italian brings the power of an amazing teacher to lead, challenge, and inspire adults and teens with a real love for the language. The application is ideal for those who need everyday conversation skills, as well as for those who want to establish a strong foundation for advanced learning.

An Inspirational Tutor Leads and Delights Learners
As with every language, there is a magical moment in the learning of Italian. It takes place that day on the streets of Rome when you can form a full sentence and actually understand the response. The Fluenz team has created a path through Italian specifically designed to lead English speakers to this special moment--and to the greater fluency that lies beyond it.

An effective approach for English-Speakers
Italians expect their beautiful language to be spoken well, so this something the Fluenz program emphasizes from the very beginning. It is impossible to understand how Italian nouns must agree in gender and quantity (plural or singular) not only with articles, but also with adjectives and adverbs, without a clear explanation. Fluenz is the only interactive program offering tutor-led explanations in English that guide learners through the strategies necessary to reach fluency. This realistic, no-nonsense approach produces real results.

Contractions and the Rhythm of Italian
Italian contracts many words so that the beautiful rhythms of the language can be maintained. By offering clear strategies for understanding contractions, the Fluenz tutor once again makes a difference in helping learners.

Tailor-Made Approach Emphasizing Culture and Context
Just as importantly, the Fluenz tutor spends considerable time going over cultural issues, providing context and anecdotes that make the process meaningful. How can Italian be learned without at least some sense of Italian culture? No language is a mere dictionary, and serious language learning must go beyond the simple pairing of words and images.

Great One-On-One Teaching
Fluenz Italian is divided into sessions that are introduced and led by the on-screen tutor. After a realistic conversation between native Italian speakers, she returns to give a full tutorial on all the new words and structures to be learned in that session.

Engaging Workouts
Next comes a series of challenging workouts that provide an ideal training ground for developing the learner's reading, writing, listening, and speaking abilities. Each session features a set of clear, common sense tools that set the program apart.

Relevant Learning, Real Communication
The Fluenz approach is based on getting learners to understand how to structure relevant sentences ("I need a train ticket"), rather than relying on the association of words and images to learn how to say things like "apple" and "orange," the more typical fare offered by programs that try to get you to learn like a child. Starting with clear explanations in English and following with extensive workouts, Fluenz steadily builds from essential structures like questions and commands ("How much is it?") and useful vocabulary (related to restaurants, transportation, directions, etc.) to more and more complex communication.

Great Audio CDs for Anytime, Anywhere Learning

The Magic of Learning: Audio CDs for Your Car or iPod
The Fluenz Italian Audio CDs are the ideal complement to the interactive program. The CDs were produced at the Fluenz Lab to provide engaging audio workouts that mirror the progress of the actual tutor-led software.

The Fluenz Phrase Book Navigator
Fluenz Italian also comes with the Phrase Book Navigator, a useful quick-reference guide for travelers.

What You Learn, Step By Step

1. Fluenz Won't Treat You Like a Kid
Because the Fluenz team believes in the passion and beauty of Italian, the program does not dwell on the simple pairing of images and words. Instead, the team behind the program makes sure learners understand and get to use the most important Italian constructions in a context that makes sense for English speakers. The Fluenz team believes that treating adults with intelligence, rather than like children, speeds up the learning process and makes fluency a real goal.

2. Building a Useful Foundation
Fluenz Italian begins by teaching how to form questions and statements that share the same word order in English and Italian (i.e. "The check, please," "Il conto, per favore," "I want this dish," "Io voglio questo piatto"). The Fluenz philosophy sees this as more practical than phrases such as "The apple is green," found in other programs, and uses these structures as the ideal elements for laying a strong foundation for advanced learning. After only the first four sessions, learners are already able to have meaningful conversations in a restaurant.

3. Describing Location and Where You're Going
The program then shifts to describing and asking about location. This allows users to learn the basics of how crucial verbs work while also advancing their vocabulary related to transportation and travel. Fluenz users gain a deep understanding of how questions and phrases such as "Where is the hotel?" and "I'm going to the museum" both work and are used in everyday life.

4. Gain Confidence With Your Verbs and the Art of Italian
Italian verb forms change depending on whom they refer to, resulting in an infamous number of conjugations. Equally important, the rhythm of the language depends on understanding and mastering its structure, all of which is possible with the Fluenz tutor's step-by-step approach, common sense explanations, and many strategies conceived specifically for English speakers.

5. Diverse, Realistic Interactions
Fluenz believes that most people want to learn Italian in order to communicate in a city where the language is spoken and to lay the foundation for advanced learning. This is why the language is approached, explained, and practiced in a series of realistic scenarios in restaurants, train stations, stores, and other relevant locations. Learners get to work with the fundamental verbs and structures while practicing useful nouns for real, immediate communication.

6. More Ways to Power Your Communication
Fluenz Italian identifies flexible structures that can be used in different situations, that make sense to English speakers, and that enhance the learner's growing command of the language.

7. Relevant Adjectives
Though often ignored, the ability to describe things is critical when learning a language. Plus, when traveling through a country, nothing is going to be more helpful than "bigger," "smaller," "less expensive," and those other adjectives that both make sense to English speakers and are easily used in forming sentences.

8. A Deep Foundation for Sophisticated Communication
Since the key to fluency in any language is being able to use the most common parts of speech, Fluenz covers a wide range of critical grammar issues. From pronouns and prepositions to word order and commands, you'll be able to correctly form complex sentences and express yourself with solid, confident Italian.

9. Getting There, Faster
Giving and receiving directions is both a way to continue building the essential tools of Italian communication and a way to develop the skills anyone traveling will always need. Fluenz creates a path that gives English speakers complete control over the critical vocabulary and structures for asking questions, indicating directions, and explaining locations.

10. Easily Handle Numbers and Time
After thorough workouts enabling learners to talk about location with ease, Fluenz makes sure you master numbers and, therefore, time. Once time and location are joined, it becomes possible to form complex questions and statements in a variety of situations, such as planning trips or making appointments. Fluenz users ultimately gain control over a wide range of time-specific communication.

11. Confident Shopping and Negotiation
Throughout the program, your ability to interact in shopping situations is steadily improved. Fluenz works on the critical verb "to want" in the very beginning, and soon you learn how to ask about prices, make comparisons between different items, and express exactly what you're looking for. By the end of the program, you'll be able to handle shopping, price negotiations, and purchasing interactions with ease.

Ideal for Communicating Wherever People Speak Italian
Fluenz gives you the tools to communicate in all of the most important and common situations you're bound to face while in the Italian-speaking world. Whether you are traveling or learning, or need to talk to a client, student, or patient, Fluenz Italian 1+2 provides the strongest possible foundation.

What's in the Box

Product Description

The new Fluenz F2 is the fastest, most powerful version yet. It is the direct result of hundreds of thousands of user hours, built upon their feedback and suggestions to enhance both performance and aesthetics. From small changes to a variety of great new features, F2 delivers an Italian learning experience far superior to anything else out there.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

44 of 46 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Much better learning program than Rosetta Stone, January 4, 2009

By	Michael Palmer "www.michaelpalmer.net" (Dallas, TX United States) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

This review is from: Fluenz Version F2: Italian 1+2 (Win/Mac) with software DVDs, audio CDs, and Navigator. Learn Italian with the latest upgrade. (DVD-ROM)

Some back ground information to my experience learning Italian.

I bought Rosetta Stone in October 2006, Italian level one and used it for 6 weeks. I was very dissatisfied with what I was learning and returned for a full refund without any problems. I left a review on Amazon if anyone care to read it. Just click on my name and scroll down in my reviews - it is not the newest Rosetta Stone.

I then purchased Pimseluer Italian, level 1. I was and am very happy with their program and way of learning. I spent one year, about 7 hours a week learning it before a trip to Italy. I was not fluent, but I learned a lot of Italian. I could understand more than speak it.

This brings me to Fluenz. I have been looking for another program to help supplement my Pimsleur learning. I really did consider Rosetta until I stumbled upon Fluenz on Amazon. I purchased after reading some good reviews. I was not disappointed.

I have done 5 lessons (usually an hour each). I also skipped ahead and looked at some of the other lessons. Because I already have some good Italian learning experience, I am finding the Fluenz program is really helping me. I also believe, even for a true beginner, I think the Fluenz learning is laid out extremely well and will benefit anyone who wants to learn Italian. However, it won't come automatically. Just like anything new, you will have to put the time and effort in if you want to really learn.

Some things I really like about Fluenz are you get to listen to different speakers saying the same words. This is very helpful to hear how different voices sound saying the same words.

I also like having to write the Italian answers to English. You write what you see, then later you hear the Italian word, which you have to write also. This really helps reinforce what I am learning.

Using a microphone, you record yourself speaking dialogue then listen to see if you sound like the speakers. This is very helpful, though it is just for a short part of the lesson.

Having worked with Pimsleur, where you only hear the words, Fluenz is great because you hear and see the words. It really helps ingrain the words.

The best thing about Fluenz is the lessons are real world conversations. Not picking dogs and children from pictures. As an example, lesson two and three you learn how to order coffee, water and something to eat in a café, be it for yourself or for your friend and ask for the bill. While they may not sound like a big deal, it is. That is real world conversation.


Bottom line is this is an excellent program. I am very pleased and satisfied with my purchase. In my humble opinion, it is far superior to Rosetta Stone (which I did for six weeks every night, then returned). This obvious, but no matter what program you use, you have to put in the hours. The only better way to learn is immersion or at least have a friend to learn with.

42 of 46 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Strongly recommended!, September 25, 2008

By	M. Zuloaga (New York, NY) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Fluenz Version F2: Italian 1+2 (Win/Mac) with software DVDs, audio CDs, and Navigator. Learn Italian with the latest upgrade. (DVD-ROM)

I did the Fluenz Mandarin course last year, was impressed with the program, and then spent two succesful weeks in Harbin for work (btw, Harbin prides itself with speaking the best Mandarin in China). Because Italian has been my life-long unfulfilled passion, I didn't hesitate to buy Italian 1 when I first saw it. Seeing that Italian 2 just came out, I decided to put in an order, but also to write this review as there are no others yet. This small company is doing an admirable job and everyone should know about it.

These have been my impressions of Fluenz Italian so far:
1. The teacher in the box concept, and the charismatic Sonia, continue to be the hallmark of Fluenz. She is there at every step anticipating the typical questions an English speaker is bound to have when faced with the many rules and issues in Italian. I've been listening to the language for decades during my many visits there, and I actually know many words, but from words to phrases there is a path--and she shows the way in a gentle, reassuring way.
2. The approach is slow and deliberate, and Italian has enough complexity in the way sentences are formed that this pays off. Every single word taught is immediately useful in the building of bigger sentences so that nothing is wasted.
3. In between the tutorial and a final video, there are many workouts that seem simple at first, but reveal themselves as quite ingenious as you go through the process. All the workouts in a given session cover the material offered in that session, as well as everything learned up to then, and as you practice writing, reading, listening and recording your own voice, the connections really come alive. Just as if you were building a jigsaw puzzle, things get easier as the pieces fall into place
4. The actual presentation is very appealing and helps your learning. The video has excellent quality, and the photographic tour of Italy makes the process inpiring.
5. The last point would be the evident passion for, and knowledge of Italy displayed throughout the video tutorials, and in the choice of material learned. Every video explanation comes with cultural and personal context showing much love and dedication for the subject matter. Having completed the Mandarin course, it is evident that the choice of vocab is very specific both to Italian culture, and the realities of English speaking learning Italian.
All in all a welcome addition, and one I believe clearly stands out so I put in my strong recommendation.

25 of 28 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Maybe the best language system ever, October 2, 2008

By	Neil Janin (Paris) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

This review is from: Fluenz Version F2: Italian 1+2 (Win/Mac) with software DVDs, audio CDs, and Navigator. Learn Italian with the latest upgrade. (DVD-ROM)

This is a very different, and much superior, language training system. Like other programs Fluenz uses a variety of exercises to get you to learn - both oral and written. What is really different is the pedagogy. Fluenz leverages your knowledge of English to understand and learn Italian. I checked out the main competitor, Rosetta Stone and it seems to be based on having you learn as kids learn a language i.e. by association of colors and objects with words, and by acquiring the feel of the language through hearing. I am in my fifties and I don't learn like a child. I have a grammar ingrained in me, a language with which I am familiar, and enough inhibition to stop me from spouting forth in a foreign language if I am not a bit sure that I will not make a fool out of myself.
Fluenz is easy to use right out of its Ferrari red box. The interface is elegant and Italian in style, so you feel immediately in the context of Italy. You are greeted by a teacher in English (and Italian). She guides you through the lessons, emphasizing certain points, encouraging you to stick with difficulties, and generally acting like a real person. I first thought it would be stilted and artificial. It isn't. I am now attached to her and she keeps me coming back to my session - which is half the battle in learning a language. You don't have to worry about whether you should do vocabulary, grammar, or voice exercises, they are all bundled together in a seamless way. Just follow the teacher and her instructions. Help is very easy to access and is a combination of instructions and video. This is the best product o the market.
What's fun is that by the second session, about 3 hours of work in all, you can order and respond with confidence with an Italian waiter in a café. It is a good illustration of the power of this program: you learn right away how to use verbs and put together a simple phrase with useful vocabulary (as opposed to knowing the word for leaf and grass, which you will not use so often). My son did well to give me this program,and I, in turn, would recommend Fluenz to the serious student for the simplicity of the interface, the quality of the product, and above all the insightfulness of the pedagogy. You won't need anything else.